


The Northern Diaries

by pantaloonwarrior



Series: Skyrim Saga [1]
Category: Twenty One Pilots
Genre: Alternate Universe - Medieval, Bandits & Outlaws, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Hunter Josh, M/M, Minor Character Death, Peasant Tyler, Pining, Skyrim - Freeform, Skyrim Civil War, Slow Burn, Strangers to Lovers, Tetanus/lockjaw, The Elder Scrolls Universe, Wild animals, Zoonosis, inspired by video games
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-20
Updated: 2019-10-17
Packaged: 2019-11-06 04:09:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 10
Words: 60,634
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17932568
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pantaloonwarrior/pseuds/pantaloonwarrior
Summary: Josh is not the one looking for trouble, yet he finds himself in one when he discovers a frozen body in The Pale of Skyrim. He gets attacked by a desperate wanderer named Tyler, who says he’s looking for his lost brother.In times of need, crossing paths with a stranger might become one’s greatest fortune. Tied by their losses in past and present, the two head out to the north together, further than either of them have ever been. With their instincts as their only guide, the land of Skyrim is known by its cruelty and having its way carving a man down to his true self.They will feel it in their flesh.





	1. The Hunter And The Stranger

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m finally getting this show on the road. I’m really excited about this one; Skyrim has always been a home away from home for me and I can’t believe that I’m getting to mix two of my favorite things together. I’ve been working on this thing for a long time now and I can only hope that everything works out in the end.
> 
> Title inspired by The Northerner Diaries by Jeremy Soule.

A hawk circles high over his head. Josh squints his eyes to sharpen his senses, observing the bird’s movements that so flawlessly blend in with the grey sky where the last rays of sunshine were showing themselves. Down on the ground, the prey bird’s movements looked slow from where he’s crouching. Back and forth, up and down it flies, looking for a spoil with eyes so sharp that Josh can only imagine what’s it like to hunt like that - to move around so easily without having to waste your energy in a swamp of ice and snow that drains your strength and makes you dream having wings of your own. How easy it would be, soaring through the sky and sinking your dagger-sharp claws into your victim’s flesh and be done with it.

What a life would it be, Josh ponders as he watches the beast. He fixes his gloves, shoving his hands deeper into the warm leather. Grabbing his bow that leans against his thigh, Josh heaves himself back up. He’s been lurking around here for days now, open for the wild, looking for his own prey while fighting the cold weather, all with minimal success.

Josh is not a hawk, yet much less of a coward who yields to jeopardy.

For Josh is a hunter too, and a damn good hunter at that. _Skilled_ is the word that he likes to use. His mother said he’s been blessed by the Divines, Josh’s father called him gifted. Josh himself took none of that, for it’s all about practice; what started with little kids’ games to catch running rabbits and luring pheasants into the simple handcrafted traps ended up becoming his daily bread.

He used to do it with his brother Jordan a lot. With scraped knees and runny noses, they used to sneak out during the long summer nights and take their father’s hunting bow despite their very young age.

They started with old crows and huge but slow mudcrabs they’d dug out at the riverbanks. Using sticks to lure them out of hiding, they teased the poor creatures until they would get angry and start attacking back. Scuttling across the ground, their sloppy movements made the aiming fun and much easier, giving them an easy target for the beginnings.

Josh killed down his first elk at the age of seven. It never took more than a good shot and a punctured lung, yet Josh roared in happiness. However the big pile of dead meat was too heavy for his tiny body to haul back to the village, so he ran back to get his father who worked the lumber there.

They didn’t believe him at first. Yet he whined till the men started whining, and Josh’s father was forced to leave his sawmill with three other men to run at his tail. When they arrived, Josh’s father was amazed to find the corpus and his son’s self-crafted arrows buried on its side.

" _Y_ _ou’re going to be a hunter, son,”_ came his father’s dazed words then. Josh knew so. He still doesn’t believe in Divines, nor does he believe in brilliance, but he tends to count his lucky stars.

One time he was fortunate enough to find fresh meat that was already dead. He’d found a grown deer fawn, exhausted of the harsh environment and left behind by its own herd as its legs refused to carry their own weight. Josh picked it up from the snowbanks, carried it to his camp and put its juicy meat into a soup and ate it with fellow huntsmen. He salted the rest of the meat for later use, and prepared a fleece of its soft fur. To this day, Josh uses it to keep his waist warm.

That day was one of the best of Josh’s life.

He doesn’t know why he’s thinking about these things. Maybe because he hasn’t seen his family for a long time. For this is the Pale of Skyrim, and the currents of the White River are far away from his sight here.

The hawk makes a sound then, interrupting the carriage of his thoughts. Josh watches it move in a slow rotation before going for a sudden rush. It races through the air like a silvery arrow, having set its mind on a helpless hare or a shrew. It’s getting dangerously low in a matter of seconds, Josh watches in awe; suddenly, the raptor spreads its wings, slowing down its insane rate and braking right before it graces the ground. Confused, Josh hears it release a disappointed cry, looking at what it has found and certainly being unsatisfied with it.

The hawk loses its interest and withdraws, but it’s enough to ignite Josh’s curiousness.

With the bow on his back, Josh steps forward, careful not to slip on the hardened snow that covers the hillside. It’s hard to see in the descending darkness as the nearing nightfall prepares to override the sun and use its light to let the stars flicker. The night sky is going to be clear tonight, threatening with harsh subzero times. He has to head back for the nearby inn soon, or he’ll be damned. But first-

He’s gonna check this one out.

He’s coming closer. Josh sharpens his eyes over again as he’s not sure if what he sees is right. However his eyes aren’t fooling him, and he certainly doesn’t find gold in a shape of a deer today.

He finds death though. A person.

Josh crouches down beside the ice-covered body. The dead was lying motionless on their side, curled up on themselves. Josh raises the hood and finds that the person is a man, assumedly in his early forties. His ghastly-white skin and dark beard is covered in ice and rime. The sight drives Josh to move his gaze further down, spotting a deep incision of a battle axe that has spilled the guts on display for everybody to see, soaking the fine clothes and fur with the color of tarnish crimson. The icy climate has deep-frosted the body quickly, leaving no scents to attract the vultures or other hungry beasts looming in the mountains to get a hang of the free smorgasbord.

Poor fellow, Josh thinks. There are no boots on the man. They must have been fine, boiled leather to keep the cold out and his toes warm from the crisp, frosty bites to be taken away from him. As for now they’re blue and twisted. Seeing the circumstances, the traveler must have gotten robbed by the bandits that roam the hills and valleys and attack any poor souls that happen to get on their way.

Josh sighs, checking the body’s pockets himself. Perhaps there would be a few stray septims that the robbers didn’t notice, just some spare gold that Josh could take and spend at the nearby inn. He’d certainly have more use for them than the poor dude lying at his feet, that's for sure.

He doesn’t have much time to keep looking as a single arrow bites its way on the ground near his leg, sending a fit of crystallized snow in the air. The sharp grain hits Josh in the eye and he stumbles back in surprise, his eyesight momentarily blinded as tries to spot the enemy with no avail.

“Shit,” he curses, blinking rapidly. He leaps behind a gray stone right next to the dead body, finding a shelter there. “The bandits are still nearby?” he mutters and pulls out an arrow from the quiver on his back. Setting it on the string, Josh is ready to draw and give back. Taking a quick peek, Josh can see a dark figure approaching him from behind the aged pine-trees, swallowed by shadows and throwing snow in the air as they step forth.

Josh bites his lower lip, and glances at the other side of his cover. No one seems to be trying to encircle him, which gives him a momentary relief. One-on-one, Josh has a much better chance to fight and survive, making it out of here alive.

It’s all about who’s quicker.

Josh is a good archer.

He draws in a steady breath, finds a steady footing, and jumps out.

“Stay away, you scum!” he warns, and the man approaching him flinches at the sudden outburst. His attacker's feet slip beneath him with ice screeching, and the man falls onto his side and hits his head on the hard surface with a sickening crack. The arrow he’d drawn on a loose string unleashes accidentally at the same time, soaring in a sloppy arc and hitting the ground with a clattering sound.

Josh doesn’t hesitate to act and move up close and aim at the back of his attacker’s skull. The man is still catching his knocked out breath on the ground when Josh’s shadow runs over him. The ice crunches beneath his boots to the tempo of his sinuous stride. And the bandit, he curses at his feet, dazed by the sudden impact on his head. However he stops all movements at once when he feels a presence right next to him. The man’s shoulder stiffen, he spreads his fingers as he lifts them, they’re trembling, and with a slow motion, the stranger starts turning onto his back, showing Josh his face.

Josh can see him now. On the ground lies a frightened man, a thick fur hood is fastened securely around his head, leaving his cheeks frostbitten and dry. The stranger holds his hands up and releases a shaky cloud of breath - he’s lost his bow, but his sword remains. He doesn’t try to pull it - not when Josh’s bow is still drawn to its full potential. It's just as deadly as a dagger pressed to a pulsating jugular, and it gives a rush of power take over his senses.

The fight is over before it even started, and they both know it. With his eyes as his only weapon, the man looks like giving up— his heavy head presses low against the frigid ground beneath him, eyes closing and lungs deflating as if to accept his bitter defeat. Then, just as quick, he decides otherwise, finding his courage and rising to confront Josh once more.  

“Leave that body alone!” he cries out. The cold has taken his voice, yet his tone is surprisingly poised considering his position in this, a sharp set of teeth showing along the way.

“What?” Josh blurts out and it comes out embarrassingly high pitched. “Aren’t you the bastard who killed him?”

“What? No!” the other shouts back, aghast. “J-just stay away. He’s mine,” he adds with a frozen menace, starting to get up, but Josh nudges his bow, a warning. The man stops again, pulling his arms up in protection and turning his back on him, curling and gasping, “Stop-”

Josh eyes him up and down. They’ve fallen into a weird argument. It’s confusing. The man still has his arms wrapped around his head when Josh lowers his bow for a second before pulling it up again. “What are you going to do with him,” he asks, because honestly? You never know.

The man cracks the cocoon of his tangled limbs. He breathes shallowly, thinking hard about his words before speaking. “Let me see him,” the stranger pleads then, desperation edging his voice now. “Please. I have to make sure. I’m not trying anything, I swear! Just… please.”

Josh swallows, weighing his options. Dying here was certainly not one of them. Then again, Josh can easily shoot the other to death in case he decided to attack again. The stranger’s weapon is not out and his position is disadvantaged. The man seems to be clumsy, where as Josh is fast. He’ll be fine.

He ends up relaxing his right arm and taking a step back.

The prone man looks at him abashed. He hauls himself up slowly, rubbing his head and shivering from lying on the ground for so long. With his feet so hasty, he passes Josh by, eying him warily as he notices Josh’s hand hovering over a hilt of a dagger that rests on his hip. He gulps and looks Josh in the eye. The stranger’s look exhales honesty, a small amount of dread, and an odd sense of respect. Josh frowns. He lets him go.

So the man runs, snow cracking to his pace. His knees slam to the ground in hurry, reaching out to rip the hood off of the body’s face in one go. Josh quirks an eyebrow as he watches the man’s face twist in exasperation at the sight. The man groans, striking his fist against the grey ice once and then again, cursing all the while. For a moment he just sits there, doubled over with his teeth gritting together.

Josh hears him again.

“Fuck,” is all he says.

“Looking for someone?” Josh butts in after a while, staring at the body with a frown.

His sudden companion wipes his running nose. “Why do you care,” he says miserably.

“Because,” Josh spits. “You attacked me because of it.”

He receives no answer as the other stares at the blood and gore in front of him, stagnant.

Josh snorts. “Whatever,” he says, and pulls his gloves on his hands and turns to leave, but stops when he hears the words,

“My brother is missing. Came here to look for him,” the man voices. “And this is not him,” he finishes and snaps the hard body with his middle finger before getting up from the ground, looking at Josh nearly accusingly.

The snow crunches beneath Josh as he turns back. “Is your brother dead?” he inquires.

The man hesitates.

“I don’t know,” comes the trailing off answer finally. “He wouldn’t die like a dog…”

Josh eyes the two back and forth.

“Don’t look for dead bodies then. Look for something more lively,” he advices, and the man huffs.

“Thanks for your advice,” he says sarcastically, and looks back at the body for one more time, silent. ”We need to bury him,” he notes with a sad voice after a while and crouches back down to touch it, but slows down when he hears Josh’s objection.

“‘We?’” Josh asks, and earns two exasperated eyes from the man who looks back up at him as he sets his hand on the body’s side.

Josh hopes he’s not serious.

“Forget about it. The soil is frozen and it’s getting dark. I can see that you’re already exhausted and stiff from cold. I don’t want to be mean, but you’ll die yourself if you even try,” Josh says, his breathing comes out in steamy puffs that freeze on his eyelashes and loose hair that pokes out of his hood.

He pulls his bandana over his face.

The stranger’s eyes are dark as he stares at him from the ground. He’s stubborn and tries to yank the body at his way, but it doesn’t budge. It’s frozen. Everything is frozen.

It’s no use.

“Good luck with that,” Josh says and turns to leave, and the man stays by the dead’s side.

However, something makes Josh halt.

He hesitates, but speaks at last. “I hope you’ll find your brother,” come his words, and his legs can move again, taking him up the hill.

And so, the sun sets behind the mountains, and the stranger stays with the dead.

*

 

“A lost brother… That’s just great.”

 

*

 

Two days and one night pass. Josh returns from a successful hunt with a pheasant and a hare hanging off his back. A long day is coming to an end as his foot lands on a fire’s reflection on a stony road in the city of Dawnstar, located in the northern coast of Skyrim.

It’s his second time visiting the city. However it’s too dark to see it properly upon his entering, the sun having set many hours before. The torches are lighting the alleys like flaming trees, staining the enormous log houses with a vibrant color of orange. The blue shadows fight them with an equal determination, clashing and fighting for their space as Josh looks around himself.

Guards on their patrol pass him by. Their sturdy helmets hide their faces, but Josh can feel their eyes on him. Stern and cold, the welcome has turned uninviting ever since the civil war began no matter where he goes. Josh doesn’t mind. He’s on a good mood, finding his way on his own by his ears alone. He walks until he comes to a sign that creaks in the wind above the equally squeaking steps. It reads _Windpeak Inn,_  with a setting sun behind a sharp mountain serving as its banner. Carved into the hard, beaten up wood, it urges him to take that step, inside and out of the dark.

Loud singing and laughing can be heard behind the door. A lone drunken Nord skulks on the porch with a discontent wrinkle between his brows and a heavy drink in his hands. His clothes are smudged with coal and dust, covering him all around. He follows Josh with his eyes, but doesn’t say anything as he opens the door and gets in, shaking off the chill on his shoulders.

It’s crowded in the inn, seeming like the entire city has come together to listen to the travelers’ stories and rumors of the war, pondering what the next turn of the events might be. As the times are unsure and provide no progress, the folk sets their focus on each other, looking after one another and drinking and enjoying each other’s company.

Two men are dancing with their shirts off, their thick arms around each other as they sing and spin around with joyous jumps to their feet. People are gathered around them laughing and smiling, falling into the rhythm of their clapping. Josh doesn’t know this story, but he can easily feel it.

Josh removes his hood and his bandana, pulling his long hair loose. He combs his fingers through his messy curls, tightening his hair into a topknot again. The sides are short, but they’re starting to grow out. Needs to get shaved soon, but not just now.

He steps further into the great hall, letting the scene around him unfold. The air smells like wet leather, smoke and ale. An open fireplace blazes in the center of the room, people sit all around it, the tables at the sides being taken. Candle holders made of buffalo horns illuminate the dim corners;  the flames dance in the tone of men walking back and forth, wax pooling around the charred fuses.

The inn has a bard, but she’s too busy to sing or play tonight, her plates full of tasks as she runs back and forth between the stacked up tables.

“My father Thoring runs the inn, speak to him,” she says when Josh approaches her, her long copper hair disappearing among the sea of people as fast as it had appeared.

So Josh makes his way to the counter at the other end of the hall. Mindful of all the people, he steps carefully to not stomp on anyone’s fingers. He doesn’t make it very far when a long leg is shoved on his way on purpose, cutting his way like a herdsman‘s staff.

Josh glances to his left.

“Hey,” is the first thing he hears. “I remember you,” comes next. A tankard is raised as a merry salutation, ale swirls inside of it, and a face accompanied with an unreadable smile bordering something like cockiness catches Josh’s attention. The same lips move again soon enough. “Do you remember me?”

Josh does not have the best remembrance for faces, but he remembers this one. A shed of clothing and the glow from the fire brings the stranger’s features into a better light; his short brown hair frames his head as an equally dark stubble runs down his cheeks and circles his mouth. His leather vest is pulled loose from the top, the strings hang limply around the tabs, free and wild as the man leans against the table, sitting backwards on the bench with a warm ale in his hand, looking pleased with himself.

His ankle is bent quite gracefully as his dirty boot caresses the stoned edge of the hearth. And he stares, he stares at Josh and licks his lips as the malt leaves tacky trails on his chin to pull at his dry skin, tongue tracing over the chapped corners. Of course Josh remembers him.

“Didn’t expect to see you again,” he says instead. A little smirk pulls forth as he asks curiously,

“Did you actually manage to bury the body then?”

The smile leaves the stranger’s face, making his eyes darken again. “No,” he says gravely. “I left the body there. Let the snow swallow it whole,” he continues, pissed off now, and empties his ale.

Josh’s smile widens. “Are you mad at me?”

The tankard hits the table with force. The man looks back at Josh again, his eyes like a dagger. Spit bursts out as he growls, “Buy me another drink and we can be friends again.” He sways slightly as he leans his arms on his knees, and Josh laughs when he realizes how drunk the fellow actually is. Shouldn’t it be Josh’s right to be mad and not the other way around? He’s the one who almost took an arrow in the knee.

But he’s not mad, and complies happily.

Josh didn’t earn himself the spare septims back then, but some drinking company instead. Maybe it’s worth it, he thinks and pays for the drinks and turns back to the fireplace in the center of the room, only to find that the other man is not sitting there anymore. However Josh spots him easily as the other walks among the big thugs - two heads shorter than them - heading towards a free table in the corner of the hall, where it’s quieter there.

Josh follows.

“Here’s your ale,” he says, serving the drink like he’d be doing it to an old acquaintance, and sits down beside him. The man grabs it without a word and gulps it down with an impressive tact, some of the liquid running down his chin and dribbling on his vest.

Josh watches the sharp apple of his throat bob in the rhythm of his swallowing.

“Bad day?” he asks, and the other gasps for breath as he finishes his drink.

“ _Y_ _es,_ ” comes the exclaim and a burp, and a swipe of mouth after it. “As you can see, I’m still here, fuck, I’m still stuck here,” he continues with an agitated voice, as if he’d just realized it.

Maybe he did.

Josh hopes his next words won’t knife the man’s pride too badly. “I assume you haven’t found your brother yet,” he voices then, and the sigh he earns in return is deeper than the sunken ships in the Sea of Ghosts and surely as disturbed as the Storm of Separation. Josh is not surprised to get a disappointed mutter that confirms his doubts, he nods in understanding, turning to stare at the grimy wall in front of him and taking a lazy sip of his own drink.

They’re sitting in the farthest corner from the fire, yet the man’s cheeks are tinted red with a faint blush from his drink or the raising temperature in the room. Josh opens his short fur cloak as the heat seeps in, giving him a momentary release.

It’s quiet until the stranger’s nose is running again. For a second Josh thinks he’s crying, but it’s not that, the man is only leaning his head on his loose fist to make it stop, but it’s little help. Josh shifts his attention on something more relevant and helps himself with the food on the table. Potatoes, sausage and a handful of sugared carrots find their way on his wooden plate, piling up, and he picks up a spoon to mash them together.

His company eyes his doings. “Is that alright?” he slurs, wondering whether the food was already paid for.

“Warm food doesn’t wait,” Josh assures and stuffs the spoon into his mouth to emphasize his point.

Following his example, the man carefully grabs a piece of bread, spreading a thick chunk of butter on top of it that immediately melts and wets his fingers. They don’t talk for a moment again after that, the food beating their attention to it.

The other man speaks first. “I just wanna find him,” he mutters and finishes coating his second bread, sticking the knife on the hard bar of butter. The bread is soft, freshly baked, and it gives in easily as the sharp set of teeth sinks into it.

“You know,” he goes on after a while, munching on the last bite of his scarce meal. “It would be so much easier to find him fucking dead than keep looking for him.”

“You don’t mean that.” Josh is honest, he says what he thinks. He drinks and he eats, and the body next to him sways. A candle flames out as people step in and out of the inn, their table disappears from the outsiders’ eyes as the cold enters, blowing and howling, putting out the light.

It puts out the stranger as well. “No,” he says. “I really don’t.”

The man falls forward then, slamming his forehead on the hard pine-tree table, shoving cups and plates out of his way and down to the floor. Josh finishes his drink with a chill look on his face. They’re probably a weird sight together; the sudden clatter draws attention on them, people spin around to see and start laughing and pointing at them. Josh brushes them off, innocent.

But the guy doesn’t stop. He starts denting the table with his forehead and Josh stares at him, wondering whether the man is aiming to get a concussion. Josh snakes his hand between the soiled table and the hard skull hitting on it, ceasing the ruckus. The drunk one doesn’t even notice it at first, just smacking his head on Josh’s open hand. He opens his eyes when he does, staring dazedly, only to start nuzzling his face against Josh’s warm palm.

Josh snorts, amused. The dude clearly can’t handle his drinks at this point, and Josh watches his eyes slowly start fluttering until they close. The man knits his brows together and sniffles, his heavy head finally resting.

A wet rag lands on the table at the same time. Josh lifts his head in surprise and sees the young Nord woman from earlier tonight. She sighs and gathers the wooden dishes from the floor and the table, piling them up so she can clear up the mess they’ve caused.

“Good to see that some folks are enjoying themselves,” she retorts with a tired voice, blowing hair off her sweaty face.

“How long has this guy been here?” Josh asks, his hand growing numb under the pressure. The bard frowns, looking at the passed out one.

“He came earlier, when the night was younger. Wanted to get a room, told him we’re all out so he started drinking,” the innkeeper says, and adds, “and eating it seems.” She swipes the table with the shaggy rag, barely missing the motionless head lying on top of it. “You gonna take care of him?” she asks and quirks her eyebrow.

“You’re out of rooms then?” Josh ask, ignoring the question, and a certain word rouses his company from his light slumber.

“I can pay,” he reminds them with a matter of fact, raising his hand, and it’s the innkeeper’s turn to remind him back,

“We’re out of rooms, handsome, I already told you,” she speaks and gently pats him on the shoulder.

“Pigs,” she hears in return and gasps, smacking the guy’s back with the dirty clout then.

“Ignore him,” Josh advices and frees his hand, earning a dull _thud_ and a low groan on top of it. He fishes a small leather bag out of his satchel.

The bard eyes Josh’s backpack instead. “That’s a fine hare you’ve got there,” she points out. “Bleed it in the backroom and your meal is paid for.”

Josh glances to his belongings, then back to the stranger who’s curled his arm like a nest of a bird to rest his head there, starting to look almost nauseous. 

He turns back. “I don’t have time to bleed it, but you can have it. Take the meat and sell the skin and we’ve paid more than enough.”

“Fair enough,” the Nord says and outstretches her hand, her golden bracelets jingle against each other as she takes the animal’s head under the pit of her arm. “Take care of your company,” she says lastly and turns away, carrying the dirty plates and tankards out of Josh’s sight.

Josh shakes his head. Just what was he getting himself into again?

Turning his attention back on the man that halfly lies on top of the table, Josh gets up, wrapping himself in his fur clothes and grabbing his gear.

“Okay now. Get up,” he prompts, freeing his own seat as he speaks.

”You get up. M’ stayin’ here,” comes the grumpy argument, and Josh sighs,

”I’m afraid we can’t stay here, you heard her,” Josh says and takes the man’s bag, throwing it over his shoulder and proceeding to do the same with the other’s arm. “I know a place. Help me out, will you?”

“Don’t even know you,” the man mewls and the drool he doesn’t have enough time to swipe back into his mouth dribbles onto Josh’s fur coat, nailing his eyes on Josh’s chest. He tries to sweep it off but ends up smearing it further, rubbing his palm all over Josh’s front.

“Tough luck,” Josh says and tugs him up. “Seems like you’re stuck with me now,” he continues.

“Tough luck,” the man agrees, and Josh chuckles quietly at the dude’s bumbles. Who is this guy?

“My name is Josh,” Josh says, fearing his words have laid to waste as he doesn’t receive an answer right away.

But the thing is that Josh is heard.

“I’m Tyler,” the stranger says, giving his face a name at last.

Josh looks at the owner of the drooping eyelids beside him. “Tyler,” he echoes. “It’s nice to meet you again, Tyler.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Listen, I wrote about bandits and vultures long before we even knew what Trench was. This album ruined my aesthetic.


	2. Getting Back On The Map

In the quiet of the night, Josh wakes up to a feast of light and dancing shadows on the tent’s wall. Slowly he blinks, wondering what might have caused him to wake up.

Nestling deeper into his sleeping bag, Josh grunts quietly. Throwing a petty attempt, he tries to grab sleep by its tail again, yet it barely slips through his fingers when a scraping sound reaches his ears and rouses him back to consciousness. Like a quill rustling against a paper, it seeps through the faint glow of a young flame, coming from a lantern set behind his back.

It takes a moment to realize what causes it. He’s kept to himself for so long that a presence of someone else right next to him so early in morning is a foreign feeling for him.

But then he remembers. Josh opens his eyes but closes them again, drawing in a sleepy breath. _Oh, yeah,_ he thinks, and exhales.

_Tyler._

Josh turns onto his other side, feigning sleep. The scraping sound halts upon his shifting; Josh can feel a wary pair of eyes on him, they follow his every move, looking for a sign of awakening.

That doesn’t come. Josh breathes out deeply, hoping to escape his position as the center of attention.

He waits. The sound is still off. Then it comes again.

Josh listens to it and the faint sound of wind coming from the outside. The raw air currency is blowing from the Sea of Ghosts, hitting the mainland with a notable force this morning. The inside of their tent protects them from the worst, blocking out the ruthless draught while the ember put into metallic pots stashed inside their sleeping bags is keeping their feet warm.

It’s not that bad, Josh admits and goes to crack his eyes open.

His eyesight is still fuzzy upon waking up, but he can make out the man he met again last night. Lying on his stomach right beside him, Tyler is propped up on his elbows and writing on a leathered notebook that turns out to be a journal.

Josh blinks. Tyler’s quill keeps forming words on the thick paper. He halts to think from time to time, leaning on his fist before going on again, spilling out his thoughts in a voiceless manner of his.

Tyler’s eyes are tired as he writes. He’s blinking sluggishly, dipping the quill into a small bottle of ink in front of him. One time he goes too deep and doesn’t even notice it until it’s too late; the black liquid is dripping onto the pages with a wet sound now, smudging the text like a bleeding arrow.

Tyler gasps, moving the messmaker away. He’s clutching the quill in both of his hands with a grip so tight that the feather gets crushed. It rustles in a silent scream, but Tyler doesn’t seem to hear as he stares at the eye of chaos with two disbelieving eyes. Didn’t he know any better, he’d try to wipe the ink off and make it worse with a single flick of his finger. But Tyler doesn’t do that. He doesn’t do anything in fact; just waiting for the essence to dry up instead.   

If anything, he sighs in frustration and rubs his face, marking himself with black without even knowing it.

And Josh watches him, saying nothing until he does.

“Hey,” he voices with a low noise.

Tyler’s startled gaze shoots up at Josh.

“Oh,” he says with equally quiet voice even though it’s just the two of them. “I was hoping that the light wouldn’t bother you.”

The ink muddles his eyebrow like a wrecked warpaint. Tyler doesn’t look like a gruesome thug though; his eyelids are heavy and drooping - he’s definitely about to collapse at any second, yet here he is, fighting the night- writing a journal. His shoulders are peeking out of his sleeping bag. Tyler rubs the right one with the quill still in his hand, the pointy end aiming at Josh’s face.

The feather is crooked. Josh looks at it before shifting his eyes back to Tyler, speaking.

“It’s fine. I don’t know what woke me up.”

Tyler nods unsurely. A warm gush of air escapes through his mouth as a thick cloud, his teeth clatter against each other. Having to give up on writing for a while, Tyler sets the diary aside and scrambles back into his bag to get warm again. He shuffles and he squirms, lowering his eyes as he settles.

“Got enough sleep already? It’s damn early,” Josh says and sits upright, taking a gulp of water from his flask. It’s a miracle it hasn’t frozen during the night. The spring water is cold, refreshing, washing away the stale taste in his mouth and oiling his dry tongue.

“Mm. Thank you for looking after my sorry ass,” Tyler says, ignoring the question. He closes his eyes to rub his forehead slowly. “My head is starting to clear up.”

Accepting no thanks for things that go without saying, Josh shrugs, “The drink disturbs your sleep, huh?”

“Kinda.” Tyler is muttering, his words barely reach Josh’s ears as the mouth of the bag swallows his voice. Josh offers the bottle for Tyler who shakes his head, saying that he’s got his own water. To emphasize his words, Tyler attempts to get up but gives up on his plans as he sees his backpack lying in the opposite corner of the tent, too far for him to reach it from a sitting position.

Josh gives the bottle for him, and Tyler lets him.

Taking a sip, Tyler notices his longsword lying beside him. Neat and secure, Josh had set it right next to its owner, giving Tyler a chance to defend himself were they attacked. Tyler swallows, eyeing the grazed sheath.

“I-“ opens Tyler’s mouth, he stops before he even starts, now thumbing the leathery belt attached to his weapon. He turns to Josh then, an apologizing crease between his brows. “I’m sorry, what was your name again?”

Josh puffs out air accompanied with a smile. The gesture sets Tyler into an easier mood, bringing forth a faint set of dimples before they go away again.

“Not as clear as you thought, huh?”

Tyler tilts his head back to his lap, a shy smile broadening with his cheeks tinting red from the cold. “Ah,” he huffs out before turning back again. “Some little details are just missing,” he assures, swinging his hand like a scale.

Josh laughs. “Well, my name is Josh,” he introduces himself again, accepting Tyler’s way of not shaking his hand.

“Josh,” Tyler repeats, urging the name to sink in. He’s quiet for a moment, nodding his head as if to assert himself before speaking again.

After all, there are questions to be asked.

“Where are we exactly, Josh?”

Josh lays back down, throwing his arms behind his head and stretching. “We’re still near Dawnstar. This a lone lay-by camp often used by the hunters that chase horkers. I’ve been here many times when coming all the way to north for a hunt,” he sighs, his spine cracking as he flexes.

“So you’re not a sellsword, are you? A huntsman?” Tyler asks without looking at him, feeling for his dry hands ripped open by the icy climate, unadjusted to the harsh winds and sharp snow mixed in it. And Josh, he halts at the sudden question. Knowing what Tyler himself was chasing after, Josh studies Tyler’s hunched posture, and with a frown he says,

“Yeah, well. Those are two different things.”

“Depends.”

Josh quiets down at that, thinking about Tyler’s words. Tyler is seemingly pondering something too, his eyes trapped on something unimportant, a dark shadow looming over his features.

Josh gnaws at his lower lip.

“I’m just a mere hunter from Riverwood, yeah. Sorry to let you down,” he finally answers. The words pull the other out of his daze.

“N-no I mean, I wasn’t trying to-” he rambles, before sighing all over again and raking his fingers through his short hair. “I wouldn’t have the money anyway.”

“It’s okay.”

“I’ve never been to Riverwood,” Tyler admits and Josh hums at it, smiling, knowing the size of his hometown and the fact that travelers hardly ever visited there due to the close location of Whiterun, the biggest city of the Hold. Most travelers stop there along their way from Helgen, they might stay for a night before moving on, most never stopping by again. The town is walled along its entrances, but the lack of guards leaves them regrettably short-handed. They might be defenseless, it’s true, but they’re self sufficient. Josh remembers his mother often talking how useless man the Jarl of Whiterun was - only caring for the war and leaving his own people to lean on their blessings, watched over by the humor of their gods in the shadow of the _Throat of the World_.

They often had some lowly thievery to deal with. Only then, a guard or two would appear - in case they were lucky - but how little could they do. Typically their visit brought nothing back, leaving behind Lucan the unfortunate shopkeeper with curses on his lips and two-legged gold still on the run.

He remembers Dorthe and Frodnar, the two pranksters who masqueraded their dog into a huge Frostbite spider. Poor Stump. He didn’t know what came into the villagers who chased him all around the town came nightfall, with two little kids running at their tail and screaming and pleading and crying for them not to kill it. Their mother was furious, but the events gave something worth sharing time and time again. The kids totally proved their skills at handiwork that day. And the dog lived.

It pulls the corners of his mouth upwards even now. Maybe his hometown was quite lively after all.

He shakes his head clear of the haze of his memories again. “What about you,” Josh asks then, leaning back on his arm as his curiousness eats at his thoughts. “Where are your roots?”

Tyler pulls on his facial hair, the skin stretching wherever his fingers go.

“I’m a farmer’s son. My family owns fields. We’re growing wheat, potatoes and some vegetables,” Tyler explains, tiredly rubbing his face, and yawns.

He doesn’t say where he’s from.

Josh wants more.

“Is it a big farm?”

Tyler is hesitant, his fingers halting, barely ghosting over his chin. “Quite.”

“Who are you selling your crops to?”

Tyler’s eyes sharpen as he turns to glare at Josh. “That’s not really important, is it?” he growls with a low voice, suggesting him to keep his questions to himself.

Josh can see Tyler’s hesitance. He clearly doesn’t trust him at all. The man is more careful than what he had anticipated, but it’s understandable when the civil war was raging through the entire province, everyone being afraid of spies and invisible enemies that may lurk among your closest friends, even.

It is understandable, but Josh wants to wash his hand off the dirt anyway.

“I don’t care if you’re selling supplies for an army. People need food. It doesn’t ask what side of the war you’re on,” Josh says then, but Tyler doesn’t stop his uncomfortable swaying back and forth as he listens to his words.

Josh changes the fruitless topic then, sighing. “I remember a fair a few years ago,” he starts with, thinking aback. His gaze shifts to the flying buttresses at the ceiling of their tent as he goes back in time. “In Whiterun. I still used to live in Riverwood with my family back then and went to see the market with my sister. It was a big fair… We bought five big bags of flour and vegetables from a young man that looked just like you,” Josh says and looks at Tyler, smiling as he sees him listening incessantly, and continues,

“We took the goods home, had a little feast of our own. Our mother baked us a pie the same night, using the juiciest ingredients and some good goat cheese. The vegetables were the best part, you know. I think there were… tomatoes and carrots, at least…?”

“Tomatoes and carrots, yeah,” Tyler says, smiling sadly.

“And venison.” Josh is speaking enthusiastically, taking a deep breath and letting his chest rise in awe. His mouth waters as he talks about all the good food they had that night. “By the Nine, it was so good.”

Tyler huffs, picking dirt from underneath his fingernails. A proud smile tints his cheeks like a waking dawn in the horizon, melting away the indignant glares from before. Tyler is humble and happy to hear Josh’s sincere thoughts, the warmth in his voice contagious. He tries to smother his obvious delight, but doesn’t do so well.

“Anyway, we had quite a load when we left the fair. The guy at the stall helped us to carry the sacks outside the walls and aided us to find a carriage. And uhhh,” Josh trails off, drawing out the syllable until Tyler turned back, lifting his messy eyebrows askingly.

“Yeah,” Josh hushes as he looks at the other. “You look completely the same.”

Tyler knits his brows. His eyes look sad again, his fingers fumbling.

“I think I’ve met your brother before,” Josh finishes quietly. His words have an immediate impact.

“Zack,” Tyler whispers with a broken voice, the name of his brother making him agitated. His eyes start shining with the thinnest coat of glass. Tyler turns his head away, musing, “I need to find him.”

“Hey,” Josh goes, getting back up on his arms, reaching for the other. “I didn’t mean to upset you.” He’s not sure if it’s okay to touch him.

Tyler wipes his eyes, his blunt fingernails glide against the red of his lids as if to get rid of a grain of sand in it. “It’s okay,” he says. “I’m just… Uh,” Tyler gulps, struggling with his words. “I’m just tired of wandering around in the wilderness and making no progress I guess. Just a bit discouraged, that’s all.”

Josh hums.

“Do you have any idea where to go next?”

Tyler’s nose is running again. He scowls at it. “I wasn’t planning to end up in Dawnstar. I’ve been walking criss-cross the Pale, but the snowstorm pushed me here. I was going to cross the mountains to get to Winterhold, but look at me now - I’m stuck again.”

Tyler fixes his dripping nostrils as Josh rubs his chin, deep in thought. “Getting to Winterhold is a lot easier from here than crossing the mountains, though.”

Tyler turns to him. His throat clicks in a confused noise.

“Really?”

“Yeah,” muses Josh, releasing his bearded chin, thinking about the best trail already. “Hold on, I’ll get my map,” he says and climbs to his feet, moving in a hunch in the cramped tent. Tyler watches him get up, quickly turning his attention back to his journal to check on his writing.

Josh gets back, hastily scrambling back into his sleeping bag. The map is big as Josh folds it open. And Tyler, he scurries closer to see, trying hard to memorize every single detail as the world opens in front of his eyes.

The fine paper flows on both of their laps, and Josh presses his finger on a location that lies on Tyler’s side, who curls his finger around the thin edge of the paper. “Here,” Josh points. “This is where we’re now, right where the Sea of Ghosts meets the mainland. And here-” he continues, sliding his hand towards Tyler, “further in the north, is Winterhold. I’ve never been across the border myself, but the best route would be right along the coast I guess.”

“I’ve heard that it’s hard to miss due to The College of Winterhold. If only the weather was good...” Tyler mutters and shifts his gaze, his attention drawn on something else. He finds what he’s looking for. “I get it now. I took the wrong road on my way here,” he says softly, eager to right his wrong as he taps a spot near Fort Dunstad, where the marked pathways split in half and go their own ways.

Josh examines the map.

“But why Winterhold? Why would your brother go there? Is he attempting to join the mages?”

Tyler’s eye tick at the weird assumption. “No?” he asks more than says then, looking at Josh. “I got a letter from him. He was talking about the capital of Eastmarch.”

It’s Josh’s turn to frown. He shakes his head, putting the two and two together. “But that’s not Winterhold.”

Tyler’s breathing hitches. “W-what?”

“I think you’re looking for Windhelm, not Winterhold,” Josh says and moves his finger to the right place.

Tyler stares.

“How is this possible? How can I make such a stupid mistake?” he moans at last and pulls on his hair. “This is going a lot worse than I thought,” he says with desperation, ashamed of his grave mistake. “And I lost my own map in the storm.”

“Visiting the north for the first time can feel a bit overwhelming. Besides, Winterhold used to serve as the capital,” Josh comforts him.

“I’m going to die,” Tyler decides without even listening, and Josh laughs at his words.

“You’re not going to die man, come on. You just need a guide.”

“Yeah? Care to volunteer as one?” Tyler asks and props his head on his hands, leaning on his knees and swaying again, restless like a child, a peasant that Tyler actually is.

Josh pauses to think. He has to, for the question is, would he? It would be a good opportunity to explore the unforeseen hold, to see and experience what the real north had to offer. _Nothing_ , his father would say, and then suggest him to head to the south. It is well known that the hold was merely a vast plain of ice with snowy tundra, high mountain ranges and no vegetation at all. Further along the coast are the drifting glaciers and icebergs that litter the murky waters, their ruthless grip having wrecked too many ships to count over the many years of winter.

It’s true, it might be mortal, but that can’t keep him from seeing it with his own eyes.

And maybe… he could actually help.

“I can do that,” Josh says with a light heart.

Tyler stops. His jaw drops. He turns to look at Josh in a silent amazement that scream in a thousand words but leaves him dumbfounded. With his eyes wide and hair mussed, Josh can’t help but think that he looks like an owl. The image is about to force a smile on his face, yet it abates when Tyler finds his voice again.

“You… you would do that? Really?” Tyler stutters, still in awe.

“Yes,” replies Josh. “I can’t give you my map, but I can help you get on the right road. I’m already here, with you, so why not check out what lies ahead? I’ve never been to Windhelm either, and if I can do anything to help you to find your brother, I’ll gladly do that,” he says and folds the map, as if to close the case as well.

With a voice so tender, “I really wouldn’t mind the company,” Tyler speaks with honesty. It’s like a heavy stone would roll off of his shoulders. He’s seemingly relieved, his body deflating like a blowfish. However Tyler can’t help but hesitate again, fumbling with the fur around his legs, “But… why? We don’t even know each other, I- I don’t have anything to give you in return.”

Josh shrugs him off, cutting his rambling before its shaping. He doesn’t care. He knows that his promise might be too much to offer. But Josh knows. He knows exactly how Tyler felt, he wants to tell him that, but halts as a wave of hesitation washes over his tongue.

Tyler leans forward, noticing his weird quirk. “What?” he goes to ask, blinking quietly as he waits for Josh to continue.

Josh is quiet. But he draws in a breath, and speaks.

”I’ve been there. I know what it’s like to lose someone you love, to feel that fear of uncertainty,” he starts with. Josh stares in front of him, tightness to his face as a heavy hand pulls him back to his memories. And Tyler - unable to do anything else - listens, curling his arms around his knees, taking in what he has to say.

“Years ago… I lost my own brother,” come the words. “He went missing on the last day of Sun’s Height, and we didn’t find him until the very last seed was sowed. I don’t really know what happened. I spent days and days looking for him, went as far as the gates of Falkreath, only to receive a message from my mother. They had found him in my absence. I borrowed a horse and hurried to the downstream of the rapids at the edge of Whiterun. And there he was, stuck on a branch of a driftwood at the mouth of a waterfall. Some local fishermen had spotted his body while trying to catch salmon there. I helped to pull him out, seven grown men is what we needed to get him back on dry land. He had been dead for a long time already, the hard stream of water had mangled his skin like stones, and he was so, so cold. I’ll never forget the way our mother cried as she wrapped her arms around his stiffened body,” Josh explains and clears his voice, all the talking making his throat sore. He drives his attention to his own arms then, tracing his finger against a vein on the back of his hand.

“I thought about my brother a lot after that. Assumedly he had gone swimming, gotten caught by the strong currents, and drowned. It was the beginning of fall, you know. We’d just had a crazy rainstorm the other day, and the water was higher than usually.”

Tyler is speechless. He doesn’t get a word out of his mouth as he listens.

Josh continues.

“The burial was held not long after that. My parents were worried that preparing Jordan’s body for afterlife would be too late. A priest of Arkay from the Hall of the Dead in Whiterun visited and helped us with the ceremony. My brother was laid to rest in peace. He held no grudges. That’s how my brother always was,” Josh finishes with a fond smile. Then he coughs, and takes another drink.

Tyler shakes his head in a heavy disbelief. “That’s a sorrowful story. I don’t really know what to say. I’m sorry. You have my condolences.”

“I know. It’s okay,” Josh reassures. “Thank you. I don’t usually get to talk about my brother a lot. And I wasn’t sure if it was okay to bring him up right now either. I really didn’t mean to upset you, or anything.”

“No, it’s okay. I think- I think I understand now. And… you understand me, you really do,” Tyler fathoms and looks at him. Tyler stares a lot. Maybe it’s just something that he always does without even realizing it. However, he’s not being intrusive or offensive, but simply curious, attentive. As a hunter, Josh’s success was tied to his ability to avoid getting seen or heard, to bypass every sense of the oblivious living beings that he’d set his eyes on. Josh thinks about the hawk again. He’s not accustomed to be seen in someone else’s eyes, yet he doesn’t try to escape this time around either.

Looking Tyler in the eye, Josh lets the dawning sink in. He has a new purpose now. He’s here to be seen, and show the way.

Wanting to say something encouraging, Josh nods. “I’m sure your brother is still alive. Let us find him in Windhelm,” Josh says, and Tyler nods back, a new fire of determination taking over his eyes. Only now, their hands meet. Their handshake is firm, skin claps against skin, and squeezes, tightly. In the light of the shimmering lantern, a warmth so fierce spreads along their blood vessels, bringing them closer together.

However their path is still covered in the shadow of the night. They have to wait for the red eye of the east to open and rise up, to shine light on the outset of their journey.

It’s weird, how their stories brought them together today. It’s like an invisible bond that entrails around their hearts, clutching relentlessly as it tightens.

The ink on Tyler’s diary has dried up. A new page is ready to get started.


	3. The Old Hold

A log of wood splits in half when the freshly sharpened hatchet works its way through it. Josh pulls his bandana down, huffing out as the last of his work falls down next to the block of wood. He crouches down, gathering the chopped blocks in his arms and piling them up into a neat heap beside the tent’s entrance.

The next morning dawns in silent leaps over the sky, pushing the stars to fade from the new day’s way. The faint storm has passed during the night, leaving behind a serene horizon and a light breeze to nip at the cheekbones.

It’s a sight to see, how the waking sun tints the pale floes that flow in a black sea with a strong shade of pink. Josh stops to look, taking in the moment to enjoy it as it befalls in front of his eyes, standing by himself and facing the beauty of the haunted sea.

As for now he’s alone. Josh didn’t have the heart to pull Tyler out of his hard worked sleep when his own ceased to hold him down. Quietly he had gotten up, knowing his way when moving around silently and getting ready to start his daily chores.

Thus the fire was already blazing. It breathes the cold air into its core, a trail of smoke rises high to the sky to join the others, the coal miners of the city of Dawnstar having started their everyday life only hours before. That smoke is black, Josh notes. He closes his eyes, facing the impurity. If he listened carefully, he could hear the distant sound of pickaxes hitting the walls of the pit, equally relentless as the growing towers of shadow in the sky.

Josh closes it all out. There’s more to be preferred when camping in the wild; like the peace, and the quiet of it. Not so fond of the racket and the reek of the cities, Josh turns on his heel to get back to his work.

He has a pheasant to pick.

Josh goes back to the tent where his bag lies. Lifting the mouth of it, the flooding light delivers a bland hum to his ears. It’s Tyler, he’s just woken up, looking over his shoulder to meet the first chinks of sun. Their eyes meet for a fleeting moment. Having slept for a cheap amount of hours, Tyler flops onto his back with the limited movements he has, and buries his fingers into his eyes, rubbing and pressing to get the sand out of them.

Josh leaves him be. The bird untied, he steps backwards from the tent, pushing the hanging leather out of his way to return to the fire.

Regardless, it doesn’t take long for Tyler to follow him. Once awake, he’s up, buckling his sword back to rest at his waist. The peasant fastens the belt to the right measurement experiently, wishing Josh a good morning as he does.

His voice is as raspy as ever, dulled by the fragile curtain of rest. Despite everything he’s been through - things that Josh doesn’t even know about but still show their weight on Tyler’s slumped down posture - the peasant is smiling. It’s fading like the smoke in the sky, but it’s there, demure yet present.

Allowing a survey Josh’s eyes start wandering; Tyler’s apparel are dark in their nature. The thick coat sucks all the light into it, reflecting nothing but the color of the night sky. Lighter fur sticks out from the carefully seamed joints of it, running over his shoulders and protecting the user from the harsh storms and cold winds in it. The same fur-trim circles his hood that is rounding his face again. Tyler is holding it, curling the fleece around his restless fingers.

On his hip rests his sword, tugged away in the safe of a simple scabbard, its cold-steeled hilt sticking out of it. The black-leathered handle separates the crossguard that is engraved with weird symbols that Josh doesn’t recognize. Lastly comes a simple pommel. In Josh’s eyes, the shape resembles a full moon that is split in half.

Considering the skilled handicraft, the sword has been forged with skill.

Tyler’s fur boots skim across the molten shore, the fire inviting him over where Josh is sitting on a log of wood, a bird half shed of its dressing on his lap.

Despite their talk last night, Tyler seems nervous. Maybe he’s not quite awake after all. The peasant looms around, idly pulling his hands into his thick gloves and curling his fingers into loose fists, looking into the fire as if to try and find something to talk about.

Josh helps him. “Good morning,” he answers back then. “Want a new quill?” he asks and plucks it from the pheasant’s flank, only to let it slip from his fingers and be taken away by the wind. “Fuck.”

Tyler’s lips stretch into a laugh, following the birdless wing fly over his head as the wind takes a hold of his fur hood as well, softly dancing his fur coat.

Josh plucks another, and hands it over like a flower.

Tyler settles on a log at the other side of the fire with a smile on his face. He pulls out a tiny knife, and yanks his gloves off his hand with his teeth, putting them down next to him. Cleansing the short blade with his thumb, Tyler swipes it and blows at it. Dried up ink scales off of it. His smile has disappeared as he concentrates on his handicraft, leaning forward to steady his position.

The feather is beautiful with its magnificent red color and the gracest golden sheen to it. The silken root is a faint tarnish of yellow and thick enough to prepare a quill of it. With the little blade between his thumb and his forefinger, Tyler cuts off diagonal slices to prepare a nib of it. Carefully inching the tip of the knife inside the hollow bone, Tyler presses the steel against the thin side of it, and slowly rotates the sharp edge against it. Finishing the cleansing, Tyler lastly carves a slit to the center of it.

Tyler blows the trash off, examining the inside, testing the sharpness. Satisfied with the result, he sheaths the blade, and puts the quill back into a flat wooden box where he keeps it. He throws the old quill away.

“Thank you.”

Short-worded and simple, Josh nods, resuming to strip the pheasant of its molt. A small pile of plumes at the root of his feet grows and diminishes at the same time as the wind’s hand grobes them, pulling them to join on the aimless expedition in the winter’s very own hold.

Tyler watches them go before throwing another cordwood into the campfire, creating an uprising of embers that take off to the sky until their fire meets its waning end.

The waterfront is right behind Josh’s back, showing the extensive of the sea. A tamed swell of waves lick the shore with salty tenderness, the night’s fervor wind having passed at the sunrise. The sky keeps clearing with the faintest colors of blue, growing stronger, the last shades of pinks and yellows still tinting the horizon.

The sight has Tyler’s eyes nailed to the sea. The last night’s ink is still notable on his skin, spread there with something like a bloody thumb, blackening the hair hither and tither. Tyler keeps staring absently, seeing something that Josh is not so sure of.

So he turns his attention back to the bird. The fire between them pops and crackles. They’re sharing the heat of it, but the words they keep to themselves. Only after the last feather is pulled out, does Josh speak, and Tyler’s head jerks when he does, roused from his early daydream.

“Okay. Shove time. Hold this up for me?”

Quickly climbing to his feet, Tyler takes the spiked stick in his hand. He runs it through the fire before crouching next to Josh, taking a firm hold of the wood’s tail, and steadies the other end with his right hand as Josh brings the pale flesh of the dead bird’s body closer to the pointy head.

Soon after, they have a roasting breakfast turning above the flames, its maturing skin spitting and hissing.

Josh makes an incision into its side to check it for any raw meat.

It looks good.

Food to eat, a bite to chew, they sit around the fire. No talking with a meal in their mouths, Tyler expresses his liking of it by chewing loudly.

Josh frowns. Tyler doesn’t seem most talkative, but for food he gives his full attention. Peeling off a slice of the soft meat with the corner of his mouth, Josh says _hey_ as the sound of mushing food finds no cease, he says it again when Tyler doesn’t seem to hear him, testing the new quill with the diary in his lap. This time, Tyler takes a notice of it, raising his head with his cheek bulging out, his pheasant on a stick in his left hand.

“Hm?”

“You chew real loud.”

Tyler takes a quick side-glance. He swallows a half of his mouth’s content before attempting to speak. “I do?”

“Yes,” Josh says and flicks his hand, eyeing the peasant humorously.

Tyler’s face is unreadable. With a frown he brings his meal in front of his face and lets it steam. “The food tastes better when I really go after it.”

“It tastes worse to me when I hear it.”

Tyler laughs out loud and food flies out of his mouth and lands on his journal. Locking his hand over his mouth, Tyler bends forward, the cackles nearly choking him and making Josh laugh at the sight of it. Tyler snickers, taking his time, and manages to pull himself together and come back, wiping the bird off his lap.

“Sorry… I’m so sorry,” he chuckles with his face red and he coughs, taming the lingering amusement. Their eyes meet again, it’s the first real eye contact of the day, and it breaks the ice, loud and clear.

Tyler goes back to scan the pierced bird up and down then. He raises his hand with the stick in it as if to skoal, and says,

“This is really good, Josh.”

Despite the presence of a blazing fire, the chilly air seems to fade away only now, giving space for a conversation. With Tyler paying more attention to his table manners, the words are flowing now, both between them and on the paper as well.

Josh eyes Tyler’s lap curiously. “What are you writing about?” comes the inquire, and Tyler’s lips twitch fondly upwards.

“The sea. I’ve never seen it before in my life.” It comes out dazed, the ink pressing a neat period to end his last sentence before starting another. He carefully presses his pinky on the left page to keep the pages intact when yet another breeze washes over their camp, the salty water humming around them.

Josh knew it’d be the case. Seeing Tyler so amazed about it was a clear sign in the first place.

“We’ll see a lot of sea on our way to Windhelm.”

Tyler’s smile grows. He looks quickly up before going back. “I’ve seen Lake Ilinalta as a kid. That’s like an equivalent of an ocean when you’re a trot, right?

“Oh, totally,” Josh smiles. “I’ve been there so many times. It’s not that far away from Riverwood. It’s where the White River gets its life, and it passes right through my home village.”

Tyler’s hand grows slower, his face thoughtful. It’s like he wants to say something, but only outs a quiet _yeah._

A dark silhouette of a guard appears high over their camp then. She wastes no time to observe their actions as she steps to a small tower of a lone lighthouse that guards the sea, the sight of hunters a well known and common to her. For Josh, it was a surprise that no fellow huntsmen were occupying the camp when they had first arrived in the dark of the night. No _horkers_ in sight, the beasts must have moved to a different shore to linger and pulling the weapons of a man on their tail with them. Horkers’ meat was delicious, their fat rich, and their tusks were easy enough to carve tools of little kids’ toys from them.

Tyler notices him staring and turns to look behind him to follow Josh’s gaze. The guard keeps her eye on the sea, then stoking the fire that blazes in the hearth.

“Did the smoke pull her here?” Tyler asks and looks back at Josh then. “Should we leave?”

“No,” Josh says reassuringly. “We’re fine. She’s just patrolling.”

Tyler nods, trusting Josh’s words. He fiddles with the diary in his hands, feeling for the closed pages until they come to something that looks like a thick, loose piece of paper.

Tyler pulls it out, and walks to Josh. He gives no indication when he shows the paper to him. However it’s not just a page after all- Josh can see it now, but he makes his question anyway.

“What’s this?”

“Zack’s letter,” Tyler announces with no hesitation in his voice. “It’s nothing personal. You should read it. Maybe he wrote something important that I missed,” he finishes and holds out his hand, urging Josh to take it.

The waxed seal is broken, and Tyler is there to hand over the message himself. Josh grabs it. The paper is yellow with crumbled up surface, a sure sign that it has been studied many times before. On top of it reads _Tyler,_ who’s returning to his seat now, sitting down and crossing his fingers upon studying Josh’s face as he opens the letter.

There’s not much to analyze. Zack’s letter is short, possibly written at the last moment before leaving. Some of the words are smudged out even, a sign of a change of mind and a different choice of words. Judging by Zack’s writing, he’s planned everything out, and tells Tyler not to worry about him. He does not reveal his exact location, but forbids his brother from talking about anything to the mother and father.

However there’s one thing that bothers Josh the most.

“He hasn’t told why he left,” Josh says, straightening the folded up paper in his hands.

“He hasn’t, no,” Tyler nods in an equal disappointment, his hands muffling his voice in thought. Dropping them off his face, Tyler speaks more clearly. “I was hoping you could make something out of the scribbled over parts, but....”

Josh squints his eyes, examining the mystery. However he has to shake his head in defeat.

“I really can’t. I’m sorry,” he admits and meets Tyler’s eyes across the fire, who shakes his head too.

“I know. It’s okay. The paper is too thick to trace the letters, too. Not that a quill would leave any marks anyway.”

Josh tries it too, but yes, Tyler is right. The letter doesn’t give much to its reader, but it’s true that Windhelm is mentioned in it as the capital of Eastmarch, the oldest city of Skyrim.

The city’s current political position is what worries Josh the most. For Windhelm is where the heart of the _Stormcloaks_ are, and the Stormcloaks are the other half of the reason why the the whole province was bathing in war and its own blood now. The rebellions have made their nest inside the heart of the city walls, and that’s where Zack was heading, as much as the letter allowed them to fathom.

He understands Tyler’s concern. However there’s always one possibility. Zack might be trying to join the rebellious. Tyler himself must have come to the same conclusion, but Josh doesn’t voice his thoughts, keeping his guessing to himself. The war is a sore spot for many, and they spend no time to talk about it.

Josh points out something else, however. “He told you not to worry about him, though.”

Tyler laughs. It’s bitter. The fire does its talking as Tyler looks to the side, humorless as he says, “Yeah, well,” he starts, huffing again. “It wasn’t my idea to get out here and drag his ass back home. My mother told me to get him, for harvest, you know.” Josh’s eyes widen in surprise. He has no time to remark the obvious before Tyler is talking again.

“She wanted his hands back to work, so here we are. How the fuck is she going to benefit by sending me away as well? I’m just wondering.”

“And now it’s winter,” Josh uses his chance.

“And now? Now it’s winter,” Tyler repeats his words. “Talk about a perfect labor input.”

They chuckle at that, finding a good reason to do so.

Tyler leans on his fist, quieting. “I wonder if they’ve gotten a shit done this year. They’ve probably toiled day and night to get the crops saved,” he says next, worry and guilt in his voice now.

“Have you been in touch with them?”

“Hm?”

“Have you talked with them after leaving? Do they know where you are?”

Tyler sighs, rubbing his face. “No. I’ve thought about writing to them, but you know… I really haven’t. Who knows if the letters would find their way home anyway. With the war and everything.”

Josh understands. “Yeah,” he says. “Me too.”

Before the silence falls over them, Josh gets up. He steps past the fire, past the distance between them, and gives the letter back. Tyler takes it, carefully slipping it between the covers again.

Josh speaks. “You can write to them once you’ve found him,” he says. “You’ve come so far already.”

Tyler casts his eyes lower again. His mouth twists as if to smother a smile.

“Yeah,” he says. “Thank you.”

Josh lets his own smile past his lips. “We should clear the camp. Then we can get going.”

Tyler jumps up again, re-energized after their food. “Yeah! I’ll help. Should we put out the fire?”

Josh shrugs it off, waving his hand. “It’s fine. The place is secure and someone might use it after us. Let the fire blaze as long as it lasts.”

“Okay.”

They gather their belongings, working quickly together. Leaving behind the city that is the first to greet the sun as it begins its daily journey over the sky, they head out back to the wild.

 

*

 

They take the road that runs along the coast as Josh had planned. Broad ways left behind, the passage between the sea and the rocky wall is narrow like a slippery log of a tree. The swelling presence of the sea takes its place along their steps, swiping its tongue towards their boots. Walking ahead of Tyler, Josh can hear him jump out of the wave’s way lightly like a deer in a forest.

“Josh,” Tyler calls from behind him after a while. “You said you were from Riverwood. Have you ever visited the Old Holds before?”

“All things considered,” Josh ponders, “yes and no. I’ve never been past the mountains that keep Dawnstar’s back, nor the ones around Windhelm as I said. So Eastmarch is a pure stranger for me. The Rift in the south though, I’ve been there. The vast deciduous forests are rich of quarry, and the golden leaves are wondrous come fall.”

“Golden,” Tyler husks attentively. “You travel a lot.”

“It’s hard not to when the world is so vast, and I’m not only talking about Skyrim. There’s still so much I want to see,” Josh says, a gentle smile to his eyes as he wonders. “Did you know that there are ships in Windhelm that can take you to the Ashlands in Vvardenfell? It would be fascinating to see the wastelands around the Red Mountain.”

Tyler doesn’t answer, but he listens. “I have an adventurous soul to thank for,” the peasant finally muses in a thoughtful manner.

“And you?” Josh turns to look at him. “Do you ever leave your, uh… home?”

“No,” comes the sombre answer. Josh nods, having figured out Tyler’s short reply way before his own words had left his mouth. As anticipated, the topic comes to a dull end. Mentally cursing, Tyler’s head is turned away again, a sad frown pulling his lips downwards.

They don’t feel quite comfortable around each other just yet. However they need to build the trust, or they’ll never make it to the city gates of Windhelm.

Tyler is not a surly companion by any means; just wary. He might not be the fiercest, but he’s come this far on his own despite the lack of contact with the wilderness or the cities rising amongst it.

Josh has already trusted his back with him.  With that turned on Tyler, the peasant seems to sense the drop in temperature.

“It’s just…” he starts with, trying to get the conversation going again. “We’re busy all year. Even though the crops wouldn’t flourish during winter, the animals need to be taken care of.”

“I understand.”

The terrain weaves its way forth. Josh’s hand traces against the face of the crag on his right with Tyler close to his step. At the opposite shore of the narrow body of water, something catches Josh’s attention. Four high pillars of a Nordic ruins rise from an island surrounded by the sea, black like the night and just as ancient, giving them something else to think about.

The mere sight is enough to slow down their marching.  The place has a threatening aura to it, holding the two in its grip yet somehow nearly daring them to step on the island, higher waves hit the bleak walls of it, giving birth to an ominous sound as the water whips against the shores.

The dark columns of the ruins seem to stab through the bright blue sky, the highest of them with a face of an eagle sculpted on them. Their sharp eyes stare unblinking, forever open as they keep watch on the land that rises from the sea. Leaning against each other and forming and open gate like a raptor’s wings, statues like dragons’ claws grow out of them, stretching up as if to hold the white of the clouds in their place.

It reaches high, but Josh knows that there, deep under the ground, lies something more. For the pillars are a roof for the dead, a tomb that lies deep below its stoned wings.

“A crypt,” Tyler hushes knowingly beside him, the sight pulling them to a halt.

Josh nods, remembering the legends from the many nights of story tells in Riverwood- how the people would gather around to feast the night, sharing songs and poems filled with wits and glories but with threats and warnings as well.

 _Woe to the unwary explorer who delves deep into the burial crypts of the ancient Nords, and disturbs the Draugr that dwell within,_ declared one of the frantic words landed with a high-flown voice from one of his father’s men.

Josh would often sit in a heap with all his three siblings, staring wide-eyed and in frit as they listened to the adults tell their stories. The thickly moving shadows that the fire gave birth to would run wild on the walls around and around, giving shape to the horrid words as the shadow men would fight and die, the clutching fists showing their bitter ends. More often than not, only one would survive, climbing back to clean air to shake off the horrors of the crypts - alive and alone, yet showering in riches.

Despite the ferocious nature of the tales and stories, Josh loved to hear them, absorbing in every word. He’d often time play a hero in the kids’ games, his younger siblings always complaining to him for getting the roles of foul ends from his wild imagination.

Josh would only shrug, and keep gathering the round pebbles that were supposed to be shining gold coins. Jordan would steal them later on, and they’d be on to the next play in an instant with thieves to be hunted down.

Despite the leviathan amount of possible treasures, grave robbing was not on their plans today. Feeling no pull to step on the trail of the departed, the two march on, shaking off the dead men calling for them.

Their road baths in a bright sunlight by now. The clear shore comes to its end, and Josh halts, pulling out his map.

“I think we should get up from here. The glaciers starts from here and our path would get difficult. We have to climb but it’s gonna be fine,” he says and folds their guidance, putting it back to its place in his satchel.

Tyler’s look at the mainland is unreadable, overwhelmed by the exposed mountains that lie ahead, howling. Determinedly, he grabs the handles of his backpack, arching his back as he fixes the belongings that hang off of his shoulders as if to prepare himself. Despite it all and everything at once, the peasant says, “I can do that,” with a breathy tone, shifting his weight from one foot to the next.

Josh smiles behind his scarf, encouraging. “Let’s climb.”

The piled up snow makes the task easier. Safer, to say the least. However with their feet and their hands sinking into it, their climbing grows slow but exhausting soon enough. The sunlight is nearly blinding, Josh blinks the sweat out of his eyes; from the root of the hill, the hike seemed short but proves itself hard. They’re still low enough to not worry about possible avalanches.

Josh knows this, so he pushes forward. Throwing his leg to the side, Josh presses himself forth with the other. He turns to look, shoulders heaving up and down— Tyler does his best to keep up with him, but has already fallen a tad behind. His longer coat makes it harder to crawl over the white, making him constantly trip on it. Tyler halts, pulling the hem higher. The fur pools in his arms, and Josh offers him his hand to yank him up at a particular challenging spot.

Tyler‘s breath shears against his windpipe. “Thanks.”

They make it to the next landing at their own pace, both breathing hard as their muscles burn at the exertion.  

“Gods.”

They’re equally covered in snow, morphing their colors to the ones of greys. The peasant pats his clothes, sending a cloud of pristine snow in the air that glimmers in the sunlight. Josh does the same, digging the cold out of his boots.

“I got snow in my gloves,” Tyler tells him, earning a smile from Josh as he shakes his arms in a wince. It turns to a laugh.

It’s then when they take in their surroundings that strike them to muteness.

The Winterhold has them both in its breathtaking thrall in an instant as a thousand shades of blues open wide in front of them. They’re high enough to see the white valley of ice and snow stretching far away to the horizon, a deep gorge runs through it and sinks down low, splitting the enormous glaciers and creating a deadly grave like a trench between the two valleys if one were to fall over the edge of it.

The open faraway sea shines in all its beauty behind them. The shore is crowded with its rising mountains of frost where the glaciers rule the view as far as their eyes can carry, spreading far and wide and making it hard to tell where the land ends and ice begins.

In the Winterhold, the time itself appears ceased. The wind’s icy breaths are the only way to show the passing seconds ruling around them, sweeping loose snow with it and forming dynes like sand on the field of white.

Above it all, rising all around them, are the high mountains that reach far to the bright blue sky. Having lived most of his life at the root of the Throat of the World with its peak high enough to look down on the clouds, Josh feels barely nothing at the range of Mount Anthor. But Tyler, he stands dazed beside him, head turning in the same way as it does with a young bird looking for a treat from its mother.

“Wow,” hushes out Tyler his amazement. It embodies with a deep puff off air, wind carrying it on and away from them.

“Quite a sight to see, don’t you think?” Josh muses into the covers over his face, using his hand to protect his eyes from the blinding light.

“I’m- _yeah,_ ” Tyler stutters, his breath taken away. “I had never really seen snow before… before this,” he says, raising his eyes up and up and up. “Only when gazing at the distant peaks of the high mountains far away. The true north deserves its reputation.”

Josh hums, nodding at his words.

“We’ve crossed the border of the Pale now,” he says, dragging his scarf higher up his face to ease the nipping there, gazing at the mountain sides where the black and white cracks of sediment split open the icy blanket. Where the sun hits the walls rush the bright flashes on their way, forcing their eyes to squint and water ruthlessly.

“It’s beautiful,” Tyler utters, still amazed. He narrows his eyes some more, spotting an enormous tower looming far away in the distance. It stands at the edge of a broad cliff that sticks out of the Sea of Ghosts, nearly camouflaging itself with the sight of the mountains and faint mist that surrounds it. Tyler stretches out his hand to point at it. “I can see the College of Winterhold.”

“That must be right,” Josh agrees. “Behind the mountains is where the city of Winterhold is.”

Taking no step towards it, Tyler stands steadfast on his spot. “But it’s not Windhelm,” he says with a doubtless voice, piercing the horizon.

“It is not Windhelm,” Josh echoes Tyler’s words easily. There’s no mock in his voice. However Tyler’s smudged brows fall low, heavy as his frown deepens and shadows his dark eyes. Shifting uneasily beside him, Tyler grips the handle of his sword and turns his eyes to the other direction.

They take a different path as the ascend is too steep for them to climb up the dreadful walls of the rocky hills. With their shadows to their right, they wade through the snow that cracks beneath their boots like broken bones. And the sun travels through the sky with them, looming no higher than the lowest peaks of the heights around them.

Their roadless path goes on forever.

They need a break.

“We certainly do,” Tyler agrees, sitting on a grim stone that lies on their way as if waiting for somebody to rest against it.

Josh scans their surroundings without answering. For the break meant food, and the food meant hunting. In reality, there was no time to rest before they had found something to eat. Silently cursing that he’d given away the hare at the inn the night before, Josh turns his head slowly. At the time, he didn’t know where he would be tomorrow, a thought that he never really paid much attention to. However with Tyler at his side and a promise on his shoulders, Josh carries on, before the peasant interrupts him.

“I can see goats,” Tyler says with good eyes on him, getting up and pointing. Josh turns to look. Sure enough, there’s a small herd ascending the steep icy trail with a natural skill to their progress, making it all look so easy.

“A good steak would be nice,” Tyler continues and licks his chapped lips, ready to set off, but halts when Josh resolves him to keep his temper.

“They’re too high for us. The trail has hardly anything for us to come by.”

“I’m a good climber,” Tyler insists, and Josh huffs.

“Haven’t seen you climb like that. Besides, they’ll knock you back down if you approach them recklessly. Believe me, that hurts.”

The peasant’s eagerness falters. “You’re speaking through experience,” Tyler recognizes, looking off and away into the grey distance, and Josh hums.

“Too much to chew for both of us,” Josh says, and watches the herd leap higher the walls as if they knew they were talking about them, bleating in suspicion.

“I wouldn’t be so sure.”

Josh laughs, not sure if Tyler got his words. He thumbs his trusty bow in his hands. “Hold your horses,” he says suddenly and pulls them both down. Josh shoves his arm in front of Tyler who quips back in surprise, but goes even lower with him. Taking a glance at Josh, Tyler sees his eyes fixed on something and runs his gaze along Josh’s leathered arm to the other direction, to the spot where Josh was pointing at.

Another flock of pheasants, dining on a prolific bush of fresh Snowberries. These birds are pale of their nature, hiding amongst the cold area like a _slaughterfish_ in the murky water of Lake Honrich. It’s a good camouflage, yet it’s their cooing that exposes them to a set of searching eyes today.

“Blessed be our lunch,” Josh husks quietly and bites his lower lip with Tyler lying beside him, who admits that he’s never seen silvery pheasants before, their beautiful feathers glinting under the ancient sun.

“I’m surprised that they’re even able live around here,” Tyler says and flicks his tongue over his red lips again, squinting as his hunger turns his eyes into a beast.

“These ones are easy to hunt,” Josh whispers and puts his weapon back. “They can’t fly long distances without tiring themselves out. Once you get it going a few times, its heart pushes itself to its limits and you can catch it easily and twist its neck. There’s the saying that you can hunt it even without a weapon, too.”

Tyler nods, eyeing the flock earnestly. “There’s three of them. Should we catch two or just one of them?”

“We have to see which direction they take first. Hear me out,” Josh says and explains his plan.

They separate, preparing a sneak attack. The birds are still eating, pecking fallen off berries that litter the ground with their ruby red color. Too busy to surveil their rear, Tyler’s shadowy figure is easily approaching them from behind. Moving slow and low, his soft leather boots skim perilously silent over the cover of ice, hiding behind the piles of snow to hide his presence.

Staying on the lam is not part of their plan, however. Reaching the ideal range, Tyler’s dark figure stops, crouches down, and looks for Josh with his eyes where frost sticks to his lashes. Their gazes meet in a moment. Hiding behind a bank of snow, Josh nods, signaling Tyler. His bow is not out. He’ll not need it. The pheasants can’t fly far nor can they fly high. This will be an easy hunt.

And so, Josh’s head bows, asking Tyler to set their plan in motion.

Tyler jumps to his feet. To scare the pheasants even more, he makes an unnecessary noise with his mouth that makes Josh peek his head out of hiding to see if he’s okay. Josh quirks his eyebrow, only to see Tyler pulling out of the snow and chasing after their lunch, trying to separate the flock. The sight pulls Josh’s eyes to a faint smile when Tyler screams again. He goes back to hiding.

The flock sticks together shrieking, stopping near another wall that cuts their way short. The peasant gives them no time to rest. Tyler runs, driving them away once again. He’s quick to catch on one of the birds’ confusion about the right direction and pulls out his sword to thrust it up from the scabbard. The sun hits the pristine blade, creating a flash of light that scares one the birds to circle to the other direction and separating it from the others with success. To left it flies - and that’s where Josh is waiting.

The panicking pheasant’s wings flutter wildly, the cold air doesn’t provide its aid to carry it on its own, and the bird lands, it’s plump chest heaving twice as fast.

It’s not long until Tyler reaches it again, trying to catch it but misses as it hops up exhausted to fly again, its long feathers reflecting the sun and causing flashes of light as it flies. And Josh watches. The next stop will be its last.

“Josh!” Tyler shouts to make sure he’s ready.

Josh is. The pheasant sees his waiting figure then, and takes a sloppy turn to the left where the winds carry it. There, at the end of its life, the pheasant stops abruptly, closing the black pools of its scared eyes and staying stock still, unable to move anymore or hoping to trust its camouflage.

It’s a risky game, but Josh doesn’t mean to give it any more time to gather its strength. He’s going to show Tyler to stay true to his words. The bow stays on his back, same as his arrows, and he’s about to get a hold of their first prey together, stepping on top of the hill to reach out for their food right in front of him.

He takes a careless step. No, he doesn’t, but something goes wrong anyway. The ground gives out, disappearing under his footing as the ice crackles and crumbles, breaking beneath his weight and sending the pheasant at the end of the ledge back to its wings again. The unexpected momentum causes him to lose his balance, and all too soon Josh is slipping, falling and landing on ice, but never halting.

There’s a sudden tilt to his world. It’s steep. The bright sunlight pulled a foul trick to his judgement to blind him from seeing the thin ice like a wave that the nature had formed.

Sliding down, Josh tries to slow down, but the slick ice hardened by the harsh winds gives him no chance.

There’s a sudden bump on the ground, and Josh’s feet catch against it, throwing him off balance; falling forward, Josh lands on his shoulder, grunting as his bow and arrows press against his back, bringing him to an inability to pull himself to stop.

Josh lifts his head to see where he’s taken. It’s then when he sees it. Slipping further down, a gaping maw in the ice smiles at him like a hoar wound in a dead man’s throat at the end of the hill.

A crevasse.

Josh’s eyes widen. He’s too close to react, and all too soon the hard ground comes to its end beneath him, and Josh is falling all over again. His jaw smacks against the blunt surface with power enough to strike his brain. It takes his vision, Josh’s fingers slip, looking for a grip that he’ll never find on the spot as his feet dangle with nothingness beneath him. His foot nestles on a narrowing dint on the wall, offering him a brief sense of relief, and with one hand Josh shoves it between the ice and his front, feeling the hilt of the dagger on his hip.

He pulls it out with a snarl, and strikes it on the ice. However the surface is too hard for the blade to pierce it, the steel shivers and slips, and so does Josh’s foot.

The crevasse swallows him whole.

Josh legs push off against the crack in the ice on instinct to meet the opposite wall. His head and upper back hit the wall repeatedly, barely slowing him down. His body piles up, doubling over between the two sides as they grow narrower the lower he goes.

He manages to save himself from falling lower. Josh groans loudly. His whole body aches in the uncomfortable position as his knees press against his bruising jaw.

It all happened so fast.

" _S_ _hit,”_ Josh curses with his ears ringing, pushing his feet against the ice again to get his twisted back up straight. Clawing against the frigid walls, he finds his balance, scrambling against the separate pieces like a crab between two cramped stones.

Josh breathes in hurt. However it gets replaced with the ones of gratitude; to his luck, the crevasse is narrower on the spot he’d fallen into. Had he taken it at the distance lesser than his own body length, he might not have made it.

From here, he can make it out. However he’s too low to reach the surface on his own. Josh dares a glance from the cramped sky to the darkness below. The crevasse is gaping far below him, growing even wider, its dark blue color sinking into blackness so deep that is impossible to try and guess where the bottom greets you. Deep and deadly, Josh’s end would start the second he’d slip.

The sight alone makes the temperature drop.

A dripping sound reaches his ears as he gets his hearing back then, Josh glances down to his chest; there’s blood oozing on his lap now, a tacky feeling trails down his chin and the dark beard onto his loose bandana— looks like his teeth have accidentally smacked against the soft flesh of his lower lip upon falling. Josh feels for the damage with his tongue; struck nearly through, a gash in his lip fills his mouth with the taste of his own blood.

Josh spits, a long track of spit and blood flies out, hitting the opposite wall and sticking to the cold of it with alarming seconds. Fuck.

Lucky that it wasn’t his tongue nor his teeth, Josh winces again. The fettered wind howls in its trap, causing the ice to buzz and sigh around him. The slow shifting and cracking creates a choir like men humming in a low voice, making songs of his oncoming fall.

Josh releases a shaky breath, spitting more blood. He’s not going to join this tune.

As if on cue, he hears footsteps cracking against the ice at the surface, stomping on the death-thirsty lot of men. Tyler’s face appears above him like a rabbit’s head out of its nest, swift and shaken up as he peers into the crevasse.

 _“Josh!”_ Tyler screams into the abyss. His frantic breathing echoes in the fault, quivering as he struggles to find Josh for he’s further away from the spot he had fallen.

Then he sees him. Tyler’s teeth show up to his crooked lower ones as he stares at him with his eyes wide. “Jo—“ Tyler’s starts with before disappearing as quickly as he had appeared, shifting to the right spot right above him and calling his name again. “Josh!”

“I’m okay!” Josh shouts before blowing off the frost that falls off the edge of the crack at Tyler’s panicked moving. “Don’t come too close to the edge. You’ll fall. Then we’ll be both dead.”

But Tyler doesn’t _listen_ to him. He throws his hand and leg against the opposite wall to the other side, shoving his right arm into the narrow crevasse. Desperate, Tyler tries to reach for Josh, inching even deeper, but he’s too far below.

Afraid that the peasant would slip and fall, Josh yells. “Tyler! Don’t!” Josh cuts the air with his flailing arm, up towards the sweet open air as if to push Tyler away, but their hands are nowhere near touching.

The peasant groans in a pained defeat, pulling back. “I can’t reach you!”

“I know! Don’t come here!” Josh shouts up. In his agitation, Josh’s concentration softens, making him slip deeper into the crevasse again, forcing him to bite his teeth.

“Fuck—“  

“Josh!” Tyler screams in panic, helpless at his uselessness. The echo is still running in the air when Josh comes to a halt.

 _“It’s okay,”_ Josh grunts in reply and hopes Tyler heard him as it comes out in a pitiful wheeze with his body parts pressing together. Josh’s legs are starting to burn and lose their feeling and getting replaced with numb stinging, straining in an awkward position where his blood didn’t get to circle properly. “Just please... don’t come here,” he pleads, praying that Tyler will do as he says.

Cursing again, Josh needs to stop and start thinking. Knowing that if they both give in to fear, they’ll be doomed. So Josh closes his eyes, counting in his head before going to calm Tyler down.

“Tyler, listen to me. I’m not going to fall. But I need your help to get out. Just try to calm down, okay? Can you do that for me?”

Above him, Tyler keeps shaking, but he nods, pressing his fingers against the hard edge of the ice. “I- I can,” he utters with a teary voice, and Josh’s mouth gapes at the sound it. They’ve hardly gotten to know each other, yet the peasant is clearly scared for his life. Tyler’s silhouette is dark against the bright blue sky. It’s hard to decipher his face, but Josh thinks he’s looking at Josh with a pure concern for his safety.

Josh’s face softens at that. However the time was running, and he didn’t know how long he could hold himself up anymore. With a clear voice he speaks up,

“Do you have any belts you could tie into a rope? From shoe straps to anything else. We need something for an extension for our arms.”

Tyler is ready to get up and buckle open the belt around his waist when he suddenly stops, eyes sparking with a sudden realization.

“Wait,” Josh can hear Tyler say, starting to take off his backpack frantically. “I have a rope.”

“That’s even better,” Josh sighs in relief. Tyler disappears from his sight again, but he can hear metal buckles cling against each other, the flap of the backpack ripping open, and lastly, bits and pieces being thrown out and onto the icy surface and Tyler’s curses for his own stupidity.

It doesn’t take long for Tyler to show his face again.

“H-here,” he says and starts serving the thick twine between his fingers.

The tail of the rope eases its way down. Josh wipes his bloodied chin against his shoulder, snarling and swallowing as the bleeding doesn’t stop. Freeing his hand, Josh goes to reach out for it, taking a firm hold of it and slipping the rope twice around his middle and tying it into a knot.

“There!”

Testing the loops, Josh yanks it with both hands. He then yanks the rope. It gives in at first, before going to taut with Tyler pulling at the other end.

Josh breathes in an inevitable sense of deep doubts of all and everything, but pushes them to the bottom of the crevasse. He needs to trust Tyler.

“I’m going to climb up,” he says surely. “Are you ready?”

Tyler’s legs shift, black against the blue of the sky and pulling away. For the last time, Tyler glances down. “I’m ready. Just let me get on my position again. I’ll tell you when I’m ready.”

“Okay. On the count of three, yeah? Don’t let me fall.”

Tyler nods. “I won’t!” And his voice is firm, so sure that it drains the last of Josh’s uncertainties aside. This icy prison is not taking him out today.

The soles of Tyler’s boots press themselves against the opposite edge again, searching for a steady footing. When he finds it, Tyler pushes his legs and pulls tension to his muscles to become Josh’s rock. Twice he yanks the rope with purpose. It keeps him on place. Satisfied with the result, Tyler calls out,

“I’m ready!”

“Okay!” Josh shouts. “Here we go. One, two… three!”

His legs swing free for the last time, facing the void beneath him. Ignoring the soreness in them, the rope pushes itself taut but stands its ground with Tyler at the other end. Concentrated on finding a new footing, Josh uses his back muscles to pull himself up and higher, towards his freedom. His boot finds a dent in the wall, Josh alleviates his weight with them to save Tyler’s energy. He might need it. Never knowing if he was going to slip again, Josh shins up with caution on every step.

With the crevasse growing wider again, Josh is forced to leave the steady of the ice behind his back. Tyler’s grip doesn’t waver despite the breathy grunts he releases, using his farmer’s arms to get Josh back to him.

The nearing bright light makes his eyes squint, and Josh can taste the sweet wind catching on his blood-smeared lips, and finally gripping the sharp edge on the surface. Last push, last pull, Josh grunts, climbing between Tyler’s legs who yanks him up from the pits of his arms and clothes for the rest of the way, and the sound they make together is indescribable in Josh’s ears.

They kiss the steady ground together, lying nearly on top of each other, Josh on his stomach, Tyler on his back.

They breathe heavily, clouds of air puffing out. Tyler is still clutching his clothes as if being afraid that Josh would fall again, refusing to let go of him.

It takes time to catch their breath again. However Tyler is the first to get words out of his mouth.

“No weapons,” he gasps. “But you need a fucking hound, Josh.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Paying extra attention to the words 'pheasant' and 'peasant' in this one, just trying not to confuse them with one another or it would get weird. I might have messed up. Let me know.


	4. The Bloodstained Road

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a little note here. I do not in any case support violence against animals, and this chapter doesn't include anything depicting about it, but I wanted to make this thing clear since this fic does have animal deaths mentioned in it every once in a while. So keep that in mind while reading please. With that said, here's the next chapter of Tyler and Josh fighting their way through the Winterhold.

 

“I lost my arrows,” Josh says from his lying position, a bloody cloth pressed against his jaw.

Tyler pulls it back with confusion, glancing at Josh’s hip quickly.

“They were on my back. Must’ve dropped them somehow when falling.”

His quiver is indeed gone, something that he only realized when Tyler helped him to detach his bow so he could lie down more comfortably to tend to his injuries. His weapon rests next to him, Josh is grateful to be able to grace its fine wood with his fingers; losing his bow would prove itself a costly mistake. The northern Skyrim has already proven itself a capricious territory, and they’ve learnt their lesson the hard way today, sore and bruised, and their journey was only at the beginning.

It’s funny, how the human psyche works sometimes. Only after Tyler had pulled him back from the crevasse, Josh had lost the feeling of his legs for a while, shaking in a amazement after making it out alive- so relieved that his legs refused to carry him. His head felt funny even now, the aftermath of hitting his head arriving in delay as the adrenaline was finally wearing down.

Tyler had helped him back up and taken them back to safety. They’re resting farther away from the damned thing now, and Josh finds himself being able to think clearer again. The spot is well chosen, protecting them from the frigid breath of the mountain ranges all around them as they gather their lost strength.

There’s a fire. It warms up their cold limbs conveniently, giving a sense of safety when the awaiting thirsty frost looms behind their backs, waiting for them to abandon their makeshift camp.

Tyler puts the pressure back, urging Josh to open his mouth again so he can get between his lip and teeth again.

“Can you craft more?” he asks then, shifting the fabric to find the right spot. “Are we done?”

Josh snorts at the question, knowing full well that Tyler must be joking. He hopes he is. It’s weird to talk with your mouth full of fabric, but Josh tries anyway.

“Don’t be ridiculous. I only need a few supplies to make proper ones,” he explains defensively. It comes out as a jumble of noise. Tyler smiles down at him, carefully shifting his hand against Josh’s face.

“The bleeding stopped,” Tyler says surely after a while and rips the crimsoned material off to get rid of it. “It doesn’t look as bad as the amount of blood made us fear. I don’t think you’re gonna get a lopped lip,” he says and turns back. “Don’t stay on the ground for too long.”

Josh scrambles to a sitting position with Tyler’s sleeping bag beneath him. His hand comes up to his chin, tongue poking against the slippery wound in his mouth, tasting like iron.

“Hey, don’t do that,” Tyler scolds him and pulls his filthy fingers down. “You’re gonna make yourself bleed all over again.”

Josh moves his tongue, feeling the thinner skin. “I can almost whistle through it,” he says nonchalantly, making Tyler freeze with his eyes wide before earning a hard shove from the peasant that pushes him back on his arms again.

Tyler chuckles. “Disgusting.”

Josh laughs, but drives his gaze down to his chest where his blood has dried up and shows itself in bizarre shadows over the fur now. Considering the circumstances, he could have ended up a lot worse. A bloody hole on his lip is nothing compared to what it could have been for him. He could have died. Without Tyler, he’d still be caught in the icy dungeon of the crevasse, waiting till his strength would run dry or jumping into the depths of the ice would seem more appealing than dying of hunger.

Speaking of hunger, Josh’s stomach is growling like a pesky beast now. That fucking pheasant. If not for it, the whole mess wouldn’t have happened in the first place. Having settled upon a poor landing spot, Josh had almost gotten himself killed by the damned thing that was already doomed to die in his hands and end up to a stew anyway.

His salty face must reveal his inner thoughts of knifing the winged bastard five times into its ass. Tyler sees the grim line of his mouth and quirks his eyebrow, and comments nearly amused,

“You look pissed.”

Josh draws in a breath, trying to sound more tamed than a bloody troll woken from its sleep. “I am pissed. We lost the fucking bird,” Josh says with distraught and taps his fingers grumpily. “Now we have to start all over again.”

Tyler is silent before smiling sheepishly and reaching behind his bag, pulling something up.

The pheasant. Tyler dangles it from its legs with a proud smile and a blush to his nose and cheeks, the dark beak of the bird hanging open with their prey dead in his hands. Josh’s eyes can’t even widen from the astonishment he’s caught in.

“You-“

Tyler tosses the thing on his lap.

“I saw it on my way down as I looked for you. It didn’t have the energy to struggle as you said. Snatched it in my arms and twisted its neck a little bit harshly perhaps,” Tyler says before adding, “I think it deserved it,” he says, lowering his voice at the last part.

Josh’s fingers twitch. He catches himself from gripping the hilt of his dagger.

“I love you.”

 

*

 

They see a Sabre cat outside their camp. It’s far enough to not notice them, for the wind’s direction is on their side. The beast lies around on the ground, it’s plump belly sticking out and resting against the cold surface with a devoured meal digesting inside of it now. It won’t bother them as long as they don’t bother it.

They get their much needed food as well. Josh can feel the energy returning to his body by every chew he takes, never ceasing to think how this particular pheasant breast tasted a lot better than usual.

Tyler is worried about the predator, he’s seen them before despite their different color where he’s from. Despite the looming threat of it, they settle around a small fire. With the remaining ember slowly dying down, it’s not the biggest warmth provider anymore, but they won’t stay here for long anyway.

The rest is still needed. For now it felt like the morning was repeating itself. Tyler writes on his diary with a great concentration, putting his glove back in his hand every once in a while and bringing it closer to the fire, before carrying on with his work, sunken deep into his thoughts.

Josh is settled across from him, plucking and arranging the sturdiest feathers he can get to prepare fresh fletching for a new set of arrows later.

Yanking the silvery feathers from the stiff wings, Josh can feel eyes on him. Tyler is looking at him with his fingers around the beauty of his quill, holding it in his firm grip. His eyes watch his with no words coming out of his mouth. Tired eyes, sunken with tight, frost burned skin around them are casted back down then, contemplating his journaling.

There’s a change in his features then. It looks reassuring, nearly hopeful; despite the ceaseless dark circles under his eyes, Tyler’s mouth twitches upwards, thumb gliding over the paper.

Still wondering whether something was wrong, Josh asks,

“What is it?” and Tyler blinks, before quickly starting another page and sticking the red marklace between the split, taking in the warmth of the fire as long as he can as if nothing had just happened.  

He says as much. “Nothing,” he goes, and smiles, going back to his journal. “Keep going.”

Josh shrugs, and does just that. Slipping the usable feathers to safety after finishing his work, Josh scrambles up to join Tyler. Settling next to each other, the peasant doesn’t protest the extra warmth Josh brings with him, but the opposite. He presses closer to him. Josh can only smile reassuringly, despite them both knowing the ominous signs painting themselves in the skies for them to see.

The icy walls around them block out the full view of the sky, but it’s known that the sun was starting to sink behind the high mountains soon enough. Dark clouds were rising over them, feeding an upcoming blizzard. The two face the grim clouds in the narrow sightings, hoping the gathering storm away from them, despite having no power to change that.

But they’re together, and it’s all that matters.

“I don’t think I thanked you yet,” Josh says then, and finds himself glancing at Tyler as the other turns to look at him with a clear confusion on his face. “When I fell and you helped me back up. I wouldn’t have made it without you.”

There’s a sense of disbelief in Tyler’s eyes. He closes the diary, blank pages with nothing on them cede until next time, ready to get filled later.

“That’s not true at all,” the peasant says meekly. “You wouldn’t have put your foot no where near the Pale if I hadn’t dragged you here myself,” Tyler continues, fiddling with his covered fingers. “Besides, going back now, it was more like you trying to keep me calm, despite you being in a tougher situation yourself.

“I don’t see it like that,” Josh says after Tyler leans away, scratching his hooded head and growing unable to look Josh in the eye while taking his words in. ”It’s pointless to waste your energy thinking that way. There’s no way to change the things that happened. If I’m thinking that way, you shouldn’t blame yourself either. Is that okay?”

“If you say so,” Tyler says, shrugging uneasily, but accepting Josh’s point of view. Lifting his eyes, Tyler is suddenly jumping up. “The Sabre cat is gone,” he notifies, looking at the same spot they had first seen it.

It’s true. Having missed where the beast had gone, they couldn’t be sure if they’d gotten noticed.

They have to get moving. Staying in the open during the dark hours of the night with the bloodthirsty predators starting to hunt again was too dangerous. Encountering a hungry, full grown Sabre cat would result in an unlucky death, with their natural weapons of claws and even stronger teeth easy enough to rip a man through.

Leaving behind the remains of the pheasant further away from the camp, they hope the scent to distract any possible threats from their trail as they leave to find a safer place to stay the night, walking side by side with Tyler’s sword as the only thing to protect them.

 

*

 

The clouds do bring a storm with them. The snow alight cuts through them, slowing down their marching. So far in the northern Skyrim, the winds of the weather were unpredictable with the day starting with the brightest of the sun to end in a blizzard. The mountains stay faceless and silent around them, only serving the cold hand that force-feeds them with the cruelest of draught and the rigorous grip of it. The higher they get, the deeper the snow, and Josh can’t wait till they get back on a fair-minded road.

They need to stop to look after each other. Gods know if the wind would throw them back down again, or the palettes of white would suddenly start moving beneath them. The wind-blown essence doesn’t have the chance to settle, and Josh’s foot sinks again, nearly swallowing his boot as he tries to yank it back up.

Cursing and wishing for snowshoes, they make it to yet another landing. It steadies their footing for the time being, and Josh is grateful. Staying low and surveying their surroundings, Josh checks the possible threats before straightening his back up. Tyler takes the hint of his movements and follows, keeping his hand on the pommel of his steel sword. They fight to keep their heavy panting in control, despite the unlikely circumstances of something or someone hearing them anyway.

They can’t see anything in the storm anyway. No beasts in sight, only ice rising like tectonic plates greet them upon their arrival, pointing at the sea like waves looking for their way back home. Josh gets up first, stomping his feet and shaking off the white once again before pulling Tyler out of the crust of snow as well.

Tyler sways unexpectedly even to himself and groans, letting Josh to steady himself before breathing freer as he leans on his thighs with his head bowed low.

“Where are we?” come his words in steamy puffs before Josh has time to ask how he’s doing. “Did we make it even that far yet?” Tyler asks and turns back, eyes squinting at the slashing snow.

“We’re nearing Mount Anthor,” Josh says and releases Tyler’s shoulder from his support. Josh breathes and sharpens his eyes at the mountains looming in the dwindling light, wiping at his own forehead. “I’m afraid there will be no proper roads until we make it past… that,” he says, dimly in his pondering as he faces the mountain range. “There are no farms nor other settlements as northward as this. We might have to build a lair in the snow to stay the night if we don’t find anything better before that.”

“But we have to cross the mountains in any case,” Tyler says, nearly out of breath again after only saying the words.

Josh hums, deep in thought.

“I’m not sure… That comes later anyway, but there should be a passage to the other side. It’s just hard to see it in the dusk and this damned storm. We’ll save time if we don’t have to hike the mountains, yet alone round them.” They need to shout so they can hear each other.

“I trust your instincts.”

“It worked so well last time too,” Josh points out and Tyler laughs faintly, shaking his head. “But I think we should press a little bit further. We might find something useful. Are you okay with that?” Josh says and put his hand back down on Tyler’s shoulder to get an eye contact with him. And it works. Tyler glances back up, his dark eyes meet Josh’s, body shaking slightly as he pulls himself upright.

His voice is getting raw again, but the faintest smile gives it a lighter undertone. “I am.”

It’s not guaranteed that they’ll find anything, but they still had some time. Having no markings of residentials in a snow abyss like this, they have to make the discoveries themselves.

They’re probably the only living things roaming the mountains in this weather. Sinking deep into his thoughts, Josh only gets pulled out of his musings when Tyler’s voice reached his ears.

“Your bow,” Tyler says, his attention drawn on something completely different as he walks behind Josh’s back, holding his hood in place with his other hand. “I’ve never seen anything quite like that. There’s some beautiful handicraft in it,” he continues, eyeing the weapon curiously and studying the fine wood of it.

The bow was fine work indeed. Crafted to life by two _Bosmer_ hands, Josh’s first taste in holding an efficient hunting bow in his hands was granted by Faendal, the old elf of Riverwood. Born and raised in the wild forests of Valenwood, Josh had always been curious to learn the old man’s tricks at hunting, and got lucky enough to try his bow one time.

Compared to the bow he had taken from his father, Faendal’s was a lot of sturdier and held a completely different sense of aura around it as well. Holding it in his smaller hands, Josh didn’t feel himself as confident as before with Faendal’s knowing eyes above him.

Drawing the string of a real hunting bow took a certain technique, but it required a great deal of physical strength as well. Josh couldn’t draw it. It was embarrassing, really.

The old thing of a bow that Josh had gotten from his father and carried around with pride felt like a toy next to its Valenwood cousin. He had never even seen his father hold it in his hands, the sawmill taking the entirety of his time.

However that wasn’t enough to discourage him. Helping around with his father’s lumber and getting his own share of a quarry in the nearby forests earned Josh some money. He’d put aside as much as he could, saving and guarding it with his life until he’d have enough to ask for Faendal’s help.

The elf helped him to make a commission from his bowyer friend who lived in the Walking City of Falinesti in Valenwood, thousands of miles away from Skyrim. Josh waited. And he waited. What felt like a year and could have easily been one, Josh finally received a delivery from the _Khajiit_ caravans that held inside the most precious possession of Josh’s life.

Oh the shining in his eyes as he unwrapped the pristine weapon from its chains. The beautiful red wood was vocationally varnished, bringing its whirlwinding colors to life. The wood of the steady oak had a royal arch to it, everything was measured in a perfect balance, making the bowstring easier to pull back, but leaving the arrow swift and deadly once released.

The carvings on the wood are mesmerizing like auburn hair. Josh still finds himself running his fingers through them, a maze he’s solves so many times he’s learnt to know it by heart.

He can finally carry something in his hands with an utmost pride, clutching it in his hand even now as tells its story to Tyler.

“Wanna try it?” Josh asks and spins it around the handle, free for Tyler to grab it.

“Sure,” the peasant says and sheds his gloves before taking the bow from Josh. Standing in the right position, fighting the winds, Tyler turns sideways with his feet lined up towards the illusive target as his left hand clutches the handle. The right one goes to the string. Tyler licks his lips and draws in a deep breath, before going to pull the taut string back.

The bow resists its handler, but gives in to Tyler whose face twists slightly at the added struggle, but manages to pull it fully back and even aim with the invisible arrow on the nock. His finger is stretched out in front of him, Josh watches it start trembling and spreading to his whole body in an instant, quickly taking the best of its user.

Tyler gasps, nearly falling over as the string seems to tug him wherever it pleases with it. The peasant groans smiling, clearly unsatisfied with the outcome as he shakes the weapon in his hands.

“It’s so hard! Do you even realize how hard it is?” he exclaims, earning a laugh from Josh.

“It takes some time to get used to it, yeah.”

“Let me try again, sir,” Tyler says, swaggering, and takes a broader stance for the rematch, gnawing at his lip sassily.

“That’s gross,” Josh says and is quick to add, “somehow the word ‘sir’ doesn’t fit on your tongue at all.”

“Shut up. I might be a country boy but I know some language,” Tyler says with his other eye already closed, aiming, turning slowly to peer at the other direction.

Suddenly, Tyler halts, startled. The string loosens abruptly with a swish, and Josh’s eyes are quick to search and find the reason for the sudden flinch of the peasant beside him.

The whirling snow makes it hard to see, but there’s something lying in the snow farther away from them. Buried and covered, the three shapes could easily be taken as stones were the inspector careless. But these are no stones. _They_ aren’t, though the hardened flesh could tell them otherwise.

Josh’s stance relaxes for the time being, but Tyler gives the weapon quickly back to him, the laughter dissipating into nothingness. Josh shakes his head, and meets Tyler’s bewildered eyes in the moment. They face nothing that could attack them anymore, for the attack was over, leaving behind the bloody trails of a hard struggle.

They approach the dead warily, a sense of warning looming thickly in the air. Three bodies lie abandoned on the ground, sprawled out with broken limbs twisted and wrong as they stare up to the darkening sky with barely nothing there to cover the sad look of their naked skin, screaming for a resentful defeat in battle, and a dishonoring act of robbery right after.

Pillagers were the worst. As for now the scene looked oddly abandoned and forgotten, washed away by the cruelty of time.

Fallen banners lie on the ground snow-buried. The wind is barely enough to move the cold-numbed fabric. Dark blue of their colors, Josh recognizes the banners as the Bear sigil of the Stormcloaks, now broken as the shield is struck to pieces with the ruthless rain of blood all around it.

The snow has drank up the rebellions’ blood eagerly, drying up the owners to the very last drop of it as they lie crushed amongst it all.

The Stormcloak soldiers have been stripped down to their smallclothes, ruthlessly plundered to their naked skin with nothing there to protect their now frost-wrecked flesh. The bare skin has grown sickly pale, white as milk and spread everywhere except the black and cracked blood-rashes like diseased holds with crimsoned rivers all around them. Hadn’t the wounds been deadly, the frost would have killed them in no time.

Only seeing the damage, the cold was the faintest of their concerns.

They step closer to see better. Josh looks at the scene at the root of his feet with a heavy scowl on his face. In front of his eyes, a deep gash in the side of a dead man’s throat is opened like bloody maw of a ripped wolf, crusted with dried blood that tinted his ginger beard with the one and only dismal color of it.

“It’s been cut with an axe. Again,” Josh says as he crouches down, scooping a handful of the tainted snow in his hand and eyeing the scene with great disgust.

He hears no echo to his words from the man behind him. For the first time ever, there’s hesitance in Tyler’s will to follow him, and Josh turns back to look and see if he’s alright.

Behind his back, Tyler’s feet stay unmoving. His arms form two stiff vines that frame his body as his chest heaves in deep attempts to keep himself intact. Josh nods in sympathy, wordlessly telling him that everything is fine.

Only then, the peasant takes a step and comes to stand next to him, and the earlier eaten bird starts fluttering again. Josh can see this as Tyler wavers, visibly fighting against the churning in his stomach. Tyler presses his lips into a stiff line, forcing himself to look at the next body.

This one’s suffered the worst of all.

On his back lies a man chopped to death, the hacks and slashes of an axe litter the dead all over, lethal wounds so deep that they cover him like a rash; chest, stomach, groin and throat - his right arm is hacked in half, the bone sticks out of the ripped flesh, screaming for a painful death. His sturdy Nordic battle axe is put back in his hand as if to mock the fallen warrior. His frozen fist is still clutching it in his grip, bitter of the virulent defeat, yet his murky green eyes stay open. Suffused by frost now, the man’s mouth hangs open as if ready to roar and rise and fight again, even Sovngarde - the Nordic afterlife for honorably fallen warriors - failing to hold him down.

Considering the merciless amount of violence, he must have been the group’s leader.

There’s a third one further away from the others. She’s not looking any better than the two men before her, a similar pool of spilled blood spread all around her, soaking her scarce clothing.

Tyler’s face caves in on itself. “Who would do something like this?” His voice is soaked in sadness.

Josh pulls his bandana down, continuing to chew on his bloody lip from the inside. “The Empire soldiers, perhaps. A desperate group of scouts, maybe.”

Tyler sniffs, restless in doubt. “It’s going too far. Imperials don’t use axes,” he says with loathe, urging Josh to take his words back.

Josh doesn’t. “It could be a sword too. It’s hard to tell when they’ve been butchered like animals.”

Tyler’s breath streams in clouds. It keeps hitching. “But none of them are Zack,” he finally says, and Josh can hear the guilt in his voice, from the words themselves or the seeping relief in them.

Beyond the mountaintops, moons were rising, bringing the color of crimson over the skies as well as it seeped through the heavy clouds. To Josh the sight was dreary, for the falling darkness descends into a pitch-black night soon enough, and it tells them to keep moving - to find a place to take their own rest.

“So we have nothing to do with this,” Josh concludes and gets up, and takes Tyler from the crook of his arm.

The shocked peasant doesn’t move, unable to tear his eyes away from the blood.

Josh knows what he’s thinking.

“We should leave them like this,” he tells to Tyler. “The frost will preserve their bodies. Better let their comrades come and get them. The dead will be returned to their families,” he says and pulls Tyler gently from his arm again, getting him going and following him with steps as heavy as lead. “Come on. We don’t want any trouble with them.”

 

*

 

Dusk settles over the north quickly. The great moons in the sky appear behind the husky clouds with a breathtaking brilliance, showering the mountains with glimmering light and guiding them in their ghostly power like smothered suns, the blizzard finally halting.

It reveals a grim yet highly appreciated sight on their way up.

“A lighthouse. So far from the open sea,” Josh recognizes as they get closer, noticing the fire pit standing at the top of the dreary tower. “So there are people out here.”

The old stones call for them. The narrow windows masoned in them are dark, gaping with the blackness inside the building. No flames bloom at the abandoned summit of it, the cold wind the only thing that runs through the lone pillars there, howling in their ears. It doesn’t look very promising.

The round tower stands at the open landing between a dreadful fall and another build of mountains, free for the open air and a sweet sights for the sailors in the ghost-claimed sea. They enter the courtyard slowly, another steep hill before it having them out of breath as they approach the lighthouse from its rear. Finding their way up to the goal at hand, the sight serves them with a dismal look.

Considering the poor sight of the place, it doesn’t appear as inhabited.

Grey, long grass sticks out at the root of the tower’s foundation, barely moving in their claimed weather shore. Moving alongside the walls, Josh sees a frost-claimed well with a barred warehouse and a shelter used by horses, shovels and buckets and sacks of sand lying scattered on the ground in chaos.

Empty of residents, Josh peeks inside the scrawny stable with a torch in hand. The light drives away the thick shadows, exposing the secrets held inside.

There’s not much to see. Left in an unkempt condition, the hooves of the animals have stomped the flooring where the untouched hay spreads across the floor and wooden containers. Horse dropping litter the shelter, left there as if the sight was no one’s to bear.

That, or the place was left in a hurry. Looking over the fence to the other side, traces of carriage are long gone.

There’s nothing to find here.

“Josh.”

Josh turns around quickly, meeting eyes with Tyler.

“I found a door.”

Sure enough, there is one, yet it’s barely approachable. Barred behind a mass of snow, the never ceasing winds have pressed the essence tightly together, piling up- and barring the door from the outside.

They step into it, shoveling it aside with their hands and their feet as much as they can, set off for the night to carry. Finally reaching the handle, Josh scrambles in the snow and takes a hold of it, pulling himself forth and trying to make out any possible noises from the inside before hitting his fist against the hardwood.

He gets nothing. Josh pushes it, hard. He does it again when the heavy barrier of wood doesn’t give in. The door is locked or barred from the inside. He tries to call out for people through the door.

“Hello?”

Nothing.

“What do you think?” asks Tyler. Josh shakes his head, clouds of breath escaping.

Stepping away from the door, Josh pats off the snow that sticks to the fur of his boots. “I don’t think anyone lives here anymore,” he says discretely as his hands move. “I checked the stalls. All the horses are gone and the traces of a cart were far from fresh. There’s no fire at the top either... This place is abandoned.”

Tyler turns his head up. The dark slices of clouds move quickly in the sky, making an illusion of the tower falling over.

Shifting and dizzy at the sight, Tyler takes another step away. “So we can stay the night?” the peasant asks more than he concludes.

“I think so. Let’s check if we have to put up a tent,” Josh says and walks again with Tyler close to his steps.

Circling the tower, they come back to the well. Against the wall stands a lone storage. Tyler approaches it as Josh checks the source of water. Trying the door, Josh can hear the peasant sighing in frustration and pulling on chains of metal. Another lock, another problem, it’s black of its color and heavy in his hands as Tyler holds it.

“I don’t know what’s inside, but there’s plenty of room for both of us I think. Do you know how to pick a lock?” Tyler asks, flinching slightly as he glances over his shoulder and notices Josh’s shadow coming behind him.

Josh inspects the lock, swiping his hands over Tyler’s. Made of sturdy steel, there’s nothing special about it. Josh juts his lacerated lip out and shrugs, shoving the torch in Tyler’s hands and leaves him confused as he turns on his heels without a word.

Josh picks up a shovel from the ground, swiping off the frost grown on the wooden handle.

It takes three strikes. The chains break with a loud grimace of metal, slipping on the ground and stripping the stoned walls from their feeble protection.

“So tactful,” Tyler notes as the shovel drops back where it belongs, the steel doing its talking.

Josh goes inside, and Tyler brings the fire with him. Dusty air rises as it’s replaced with the fresh one from the outside as they descend a short set of steps into a room that turns out to be an underground cellar, bigger than they’d expected.

The torch tames itself in the presence of four walls where the northern winds could not reach. Tyler lifts it carefully, entering the surprisingly spacious storage after Josh. Filled with wooden boxes, pelts, tables and even more tools, the neat line of shelves has kept the room intact. Against the wall on the left lies a dry pile of hay with a steel-toed fork jutting out of it. Next to the hay lies a small wagon, half filled with the feed and a worn rope tied around the handle, left there for the horses to digest later.

From the ceiling hangs a lantern, filled with melted tallow that weeps from a candle inside of it. Metal creeks as it sways lightly with the draft that the open door brings with it, delivering fresh air into the room. But what attracts them the most is the suspicious pile at the corner- covered with pelts and blankets, Josh goes to them with high hopes to his steps.

“There’s food in here!” Josh exclaims, pulling aside the thick covers to reveal more wooden boxes beneath it, inspecting the container. “Potatoes.”

“Are you serious?” Tyler goes and puts the torch on a holder in the wall, and grabs another shovel leaning against a shelf, edging the metallic tip between the hardwood and the cover. Then, he freezes. “Should I?” he asks uncertain, looking up at Josh beside him.

Josh glances at the door. “Who ever lived here are gone now. Open it!”

Tyler does. He presses down with force, the nails give in with an easy sigh, showing the sweet contents of the box.

Josh whoops happily, his voice echoing in the dark food storage as he pulls the cover off rest of the way. Tyler grabs an earthy potato, cuts it in half and eyes its core and sniffs it deeply.

Josh waits the prediction.

“It’s fresh,” Tyler says amazed, squeezing the thing in his hands. “It’s good to go.”

Josh produces a broad smile, an unreal luck on their side.

“Let’s see what else we can find.”

 

*

 

There’s a frisky camp fire blazing up nicely outside by the time they settle, crackling with merry. A kettle hangs above it with hot water boiling inside of it as they wait for all the food they found getting ready.

Josh sits on a sturdy log of wood, holding a piece of oil stone in his hand, honing it against the steel tips of his new arrows while Tyler prepares the fletching, sitting on top of the thick pelts and blankets around him with his legs crossed.

“I can see that you’re used to doing this,” Tyler says, struggling to cut the rachis without ruining the feather. “It’s a bit different from making quills,” he adds with a nervous laugh, trying his best to keep on track.

Josh glances down. “Here,” he says, reaching to Tyler’s hands and urging him to open his palms so he can see. “I usually cut a small pre cut along the rachis here. It helps to make a cleaner cut then.”

“Oh.”

“Your knife might be a little dull too. I’ll sharpen it for you.”

“Thank you,” Tyler says quietly and hands over the tiny knife, quietly watching as Josh runs the stone against the tiny blade in his hands. Josh studies it silently, and handles it with care. The small knife reminds him of the ones his sisters use as they sew. The motion that his hands bring make equally small, raspy noises as it goes. Tyler shivers at the sound of it, and Josh pretends that he doesn’t notice.

He checks the blade, carefully pressing his thumb against it. It sinks deeper than intended - a thin scale of blood surfaces, showing the result of Josh’s work like a sting of a bee.

“Oops,” he goes, and sucks his finger into his mouth. “Yeah, it’s sharp now,” he continues with a pop and smiles, giving it back to Tyler who grabs it with both of his hands as if he’d be afraid to use it now.

But Tyler says he’s trying again, pressing the feather on top of his wooden box to use it as a makeshift workbench. Steel carves the thin bone and works itself through it with ease, making Tyler whistle. “Yeah, it’s sharp now,” he repeats Josh’s words, making his first, clean cut.

Josh eyes his work. “That’s good.”

Tyler trims the feathers and squares them off while Josh moves on to attach them to the arrow shaft.

However the cooking food reminds them of its existence when bubbly water sizzles and pushes free from the slits beneath the steel lid. Tyler is up in a second, pulling his thick gloves back to his hands. “Shit,” he curses. “Did the water boil out already?” he mutters as he grips the metallic hook to ease the cauldron out of the fire’s way.

Easing the top kettle off to check on the vegetables they’d found, Tyler sighs in relief to see the earlier frozen bundles of broccoli and carrots burst with color and steam with power. The sight makes him smile, before he checks the rest of the food. Tyler pokes the inside of the kettle with a wooden ladle.

“The tubers at the bottom are a bit dry and have sticked to the kettle, but everything else is just fine. The water didn’t even boil out that badly.”

Josh puts his work down. “Then it’s time to eat,” he says with a smile and slaps his thighs to get up.

“Yeah. Let me just scrap these things off,” Tyler says and separates the edible potatoes from the ruined ones.

Soon their plates is filled with food. Josh cuts thick chunks of hard butter that they’d found in the food storage, dropping them to the center of their meal. It melts sloppily, making golden rivers that thread their way down the mountain roads that the bright broccoli and potatoes bring on their way. Lastly, he hands over a hard piece of cheese to Tyler.

“Wow,” Tyler outs with amazement, using his spoon to mix them all together, blowing at the steaming plate. “We actually got a decent meal tonight.”

Josh is already filling his mouth with it. He hums. “I’d go with some spicing but I’m not gonna complain too loudly,” he tells, mouth full of food. “And meat,” he says with a grudge. Tyler laughs, saying how they can try to catch a rabbit instead of birds next time.

“I think it’s good though,” Tyler adds, “The salty butter makes it so much better.”

“I agree. The steamed vegetables are surprisingly tasty too.”

Tyler puts his spoon back at that, eyeing his supper silently. “Yeah,” he says. “It’s almost like home in Rorikstead,” he continues, swirling the food back and forth, and Josh halts at his words, looking down at him.

“You’re from Rorikstead?” he asks softly, and Tyler nods quietly.

Where the hold of Whiterun meets its end, rises the village of Rorikstead. Located at the western border of the vast plains of The Reach, the small town is even quieter than Riverwood and mostly used as a rest stop for travelers, soldiers and wandering merchants. However, known by its unnaturally good years of harvest and peaceful way of life, Rorikstead is heard to be a fine place to live in.

Due to its propitious position far from north, the fires of the war have distanced themselves from the western people of Skyrim, but desolated the villages as the men have left for war. Tyler never really told where he was from, until now. Whether it was accidental or purposed, it doesn’t matter. To Josh, Tyler’s words are a confession of trust. Maybe, Tyler wanted to talk about it for he seemed proud of his origins, despite his flaring hesitance to open up about it, Josh remembers his doubt well; however he never got a suitable chance to tell about it. But they’re talking now, and it has become easier the more they spend time together.

“I dream about it a lot,” Tyler confesses. “Home. Sometimes I wake up and jump like I’m late from my duties. It’s like my mother’s voice rings in my ears, like that,” Tyler says and wiggles his fingers around his ears, cringing. Josh laughs, listening contently as Tyler sighs.

“It’s- I want to say that I don’t really miss home,” he continues, words starting their usual flow. “But it’s not true, really. It’s just that I feel out of place no matter where I am. I just don’t know any better.” Tyler stops again, frowning and growing visibly embarrassed. He looks up at Josh then, searching for spite.

There’s none of that Josh’s eyes would give when he looks at Tyler. He only nods. “I miss home sometimes, too. The village, family. Even my father’s sawmill, and looking at my sisters do their embroidery.” Josh speaks, testing the tip of his fresh arrow. “I miss my brother too.”

“I miss everyone too,” Tyler says, raspy with woe.

Silence breathes between them. Beneath the flickering stars they sit, listening to the wind for a time.

Finally, Tyler speaks. It comes out at the same time a howl in the mountains blares along the valleys of ice, and it pushes through a sad smile on his lips. And he says, “I’m glad you’re here with me.” He sounds and looks more hopeful than he has for a great while, Josh imagines.

Not knowing what to say, Josh leans down, reaching his arm around Tyler who just rests against him and tries to wrap his arm around him, but doesn’t get further than the small of his back. Their position is awkward due to the peasant sitting on the ground with a bowl of food in his other hand, but Josh tightens his grip, shifting closer to get more comfortable. The pins and needles of Tyler’s hair press against his cold-blushed face, but Josh doesn’t pull away despite his heart hammering wildly. What is happening?

Tyler presses his head harder against him, unknowing of Josh’s struggles above him. And he thanks him. It’s muffled at first until Tyler repeats his words, louder, yet he can’t shake away the raspiness nor the solemn tone in his voice.

Josh sighs, bringing his hand up to brush Tyler’s hair to cheer him up. It’s softer than the constant presence of heavy furs and the weather-beaten roughness of it- it’s been a while, and Josh closes his eyes, fingers gliding through the hair slowly and repeatedly. It’s calming for both of them, and the feeling reminds him of the smooth carvings on his bow that have the same effect on him.

And Tyler, he’s leaning on Josh unmoving, slumped as his legs lie limp beneath him as his body rests heavily against him, yet relaxing under the touch.

Josh doesn’t know how long they stay like that. However the gentle motion of Josh’s palm comes slowly to its end, and it seems like Tyler wakes up to reality only then. He lifts his head, dazed and pulling away nearly reluctantly. And he sniffles. “Sorry,” he says apologizing, and puts down the bowl of food to wipe his nose. He’s not crying. He’s just cold. And shaking. That’s what Josh tells himself. “I’m tired,” Tyler whispers. His words stay true to his bare voice, and Josh takes a better look at him.

“It’s okay,” Josh says, however sounding more worried than before, and their short moment is over. “We should go to sleep once we’ve eaten.” He hopes that Tyler doesn’t catch on his words in a wrong way, as if Josh would constantly tell him what to do. But Tyler only wipes his face on the fur on his shoulder, and the peasant sniffles again, picking up his food and finishing his meal. Josh can only do the same, and their bowls empty in silence.

It’s been a long, exhausting travel through the Old Hold and way too many obstacles on their way to slow them down already. Being able to finally settle to get some real rest, their bodies let the exertion to show.

Tyler is suddenly fatigued. Josh knows he hasn’t rested enough to cross such distances in one day. The sight of the peasant pulling his legs up and leaning his head on his arms around them makes him feel careless and irresponsible. Too stubborn and dedicated to find his younger brother, Tyler has worked hard to keep up to Josh’s pace to hide his exhaustion. The consequences are starting to show now.

“Seriously man. Let’s get inside,” Josh says and gets up. Tyler looks up at him confused, having missed his words. “You can’t fall asleep here.”

Tyler nods silently, getting the hint as Josh offers him his hand, but doesn’t take it as he pulls himself up on his own. Josh smiles sadly. What a hard-headed idiot.

They’re walking towards the food storage when Tyler suddenly turns around, muttering something about helping Josh to gather his arrows left behind.

“I’ll get them. Don’t worry about it,” Josh says and pulls the door open, motioning Tyler to get inside.

The pile of hay is plenty enough for both of them. Josh stokes the dry culms, digging and arranging until the sight satisfied him. Tyler brings their sleeping bags and pelts, throwing them on top and staring at their nest with two heavy eyelids.

“Get in, see if it’s any good,” Josh says smiling and pats his shoulder. “I’ll be right back.”

Gathering the fresh arrows they crafted together, Josh takes his bow to eye their surroundings doubtfully. Taking a stray piece of wood, Josh sticks the head into the fire before putting it out to kill the hint of their location. The flames sizzle from its opposite, hissing like a cornered _Khajiit_ as the bucket empties above it. The night seemed peaceful, the mountains lenient and keeping the threats somewhere else. Lastly, Josh pulls the string of his bow loose, and goes back to the storage with his hands full.

He lights the lantern hanging from the ceiling. The weak flame grows, bringing a faint glow of light in the cell of dark space.

Josh bars the door from the inside. It gives him a peace of mind and a sincere thoughts of a good rest as the thick walls keep the wind out. They got lucky.

Among the hay beneath the countless amount of blankets of thick wolf skins is Tyler, his closed eyes and the dark muss of hair the only things sticking out and barely standing out of all the fur. The peasant is out like a light, lying loosely on his side, curled up as the cold has settled deeply in his bones, however not enough to keep him from much needed rest.

Josh goes to help him. Two bodies together are warmer than one, and Josh puts his bow down, the hay rustling noisily as he steps into the pile of it to get beneath the covers.

Tyler wakes up to the hassle, having fallen so steeply asleep Josh’s dark figure hovering over him nearly startles him.

“It’s me,” Josh soothes him instantly. “Sorry. Go back to sleep.”

But Tyler only looks at him as dormantly as the sudden rush allows him, refusing to close his eyes just yet as he reaches over him, pulling one of the furs that lies on top of him and settling it over both of their shoulders as Josh settles in their shelter, fixing their covers to make sure no warmth could escape.

The only thing to do is get the heat coming.

“Stay close,” Josh says and shifts closer to the peasant. “We need to stay warm.”

Tyler makes a sound that could carelessly be taken as a whimper amongst all the hay hissing around them. And the peasant slips towards him without a second thought, however not seeming to believe his ears at Josh’s next words.

“Closer.”

The owl is back, Josh recognizes. Tyler’s eyes stare wide into his. However they narrow again in a wave of sadness, and Josh’s body feels an armoring of a shiver run through his skin as Tyler presses flush against him. Tyler’s body is chilled to the bone, a shivering weight of ice in a human form.

With his long inheritance as a son of Skyrim, Josh has an inborn gift to manage in a cold weather, an inner flame that keeps his blood strong and warm. Josh wishes he could share this power, and does his best to radiate the much needed warmth for the peasant to use it, pulling him closer.

In the maze of the mountains, a pack of wolves howl in the search for food. Tyler draws in a heavy breath, releasing it with an equal force as he drifts away. They fall asleep at the root of the abandoned lighthouse in the middle of the Old Hold, pressed tightly together, and Josh can’t argue that the much needed closeness is melting his dreary fears. They’ll be okay, as long as they stay together.

The moons and the stars shift through the night sky. In his sleep, Josh grows colder as the warmth leaves space between them. Sighing soundly, Josh turns onto his stomach and chases instinctively after it, hay rustling as he reaches out for the missing body next to him.

A hand finds his, fingers pressing against his skin, caressing until he falls back asleep before waking up fully. In his dream, Josh hears the familiar sound of a quill scraping against a paper, and somebody crying.


	5. Wayward Pass

The underground walls and its ceiling over their heads block out the sun. It’s dark inside the food storage where they’ve spent the night with a few nosy chinks of light pushing their way through the narrow holes in the hardwood door at the hidden entrance.

The lantern has ran to its end during the night, deepening the lulling dimness. With the shared warmth as comforting as the break of dawn, the chill of the food cellar or the outside world cannot reach them.

It pulls Josh more awake every waking second, blinking the gravel out of his eyes. Squirming leisurely to stretch his sore muscles, Josh’s head bumps against Tyler’s who’s curled up against him, his head resting on Josh’s shoulder and taking a good use of his makeshift pillow.

Tyler is still asleep. Josh can read it from the lax features on his face. Soft puffs of air come out evenly- something that Josh can’t see, but rather feel against his neck.

Tyler’s hand lays on top of his diary that lays on top of Josh’s chest. Josh is surprised to find it resting between them; he didn’t notice the peasant having it when they went to sleep last night. But it’s here, closed as its nightly urge to get fed with ink had kept the peasant awake, however eventually guiding him to step over the edge of the real world and all the way to the realm of sleep, as it seemed to him.

Josh sighs. About to free his own hand and move the little thing somewhere safer, Josh carefully reaches out, but it’s then when Tyler’s eyes flutter open beside him.

He seems so instinctive as he curls his fingers against his diary and pulls it under the covers himself. However it’s not panicked; the hay rustles quietly at Tyler’s slow movements as he shifts the tome to rest against himself as if to keep it warm as well. Tyler doesn’t pull away from Josh though; waking up slowly, Tyler’s eyes focus equally undetermined as he struggles to wake up.

He only curls tighter into himself, making sounds. Josh guesses the cold is unyielding for some after all.

Tyler’s throat clicks when he swallows. “Morning,” he mutters languidly.

His voice barely gets out there. Tyler coughs. With his voice more warmed up and runnier, Josh confirms his words, which Tyler smiles for, huffing,

“I wasn’t quite sure honestly,” he says and blinks before slowly pulling himself up into sitting position. Moving as if he was still dreaming, Tyler’s back is hunched as he rubs his eyes. They seem slightly red-swollen and blotchy, so full of sand that the sight gets only worse with the peasant scratching his knuckles all over them. Josh frowns. Maybe it’s just the roughness that Tyler treats his dry skin with, but Josh can’t help but ask,

“Got enough sleep?”

Tyler is quick to straighten his body and trying to sound brighter. “Yeah,” he asserts, giving a haunted look at Josh. “Eventually.”

Josh nods quietly, eyeing Tyler worriedly.

“You nearly passed out outside last night.”

At that, Tyler says nothing, staring at an empty spot beside them. The heavy bags under his eyes pull the skin down, making his eyes unbelievably wider. Clearly unable to admit his limits, Tyler pulls his fingers through his hair, blinking before speaking,

“Wouldn’t be the first time,” he only says and shrugs nonchalantly, and Josh is out of words. About to open his mouth and throw a few strict words at the other, Tyler huffs and smiles,

“Just kidding. But it did happen once, but not here and certainly not last night. In the fields,” Tyler says and nods nearly obscurely. “It was a long day,” he finishes as if it was the simplest thing in the world and looks back at Josh.

“You still should have said something. I was sort of scared at some point.” Tyler stares at him in the dim light, a faint glint reflecting from his eyes as he waits Josh to continue. “We have to be honest with each other, okay? No needless risks anymore or we’ll never make it. That goes to me too, and I promise to stay sincere with you as well.”

“I know,” Tyler assures, nearly too quickly for Josh’s liking. However Tyler continues, and Josh has to believe him or their vow is meaningless. “So take my word when I say that I’m okay, and I’m ready to continue. I know I’m a terrible sight, I really do, but you’ll just have to deal with it.”

Josh snorts, releasing a gush of laughter. And he takes it. Josh takes it, smiling as he pulls himself up and out of the pile of feed.

“I guess you leave me no choice. Let’s keep going if you’re so sure then,” Josh pats himself clean of they stray culms and grass, and offers Tyler his hand to pull him up.

Tyler takes it, and lets himself be pulled up on his feet. With his diary in his hand, Tyler is about to force his eyes away from him, before noticing something and taking step towards him instead.

He reaches out to gently pull a culm of hay out of Josh’s hair.

“Oh. Thanks,” Josh says as Tyler’s fingers fiddle like butterfly wings as he lets go of the feed.

“Anytime man.”

 

*

 

  
They see more buildings. With the new day having raised and brightened at the sun’s arrival, stand the three towers in the distance, four if one of them wouldn’t be trapped in ice. The pointed top of it barely pushes out of it, like a spear piercing its captor, but having no power over it.

“Tyler, look,” Josh points towards the place where the mountains diverges from each other behind the three towers, leaping away as if they’ve been cut in half with a sword. “It’s the passage to the other side. I can’t believe how close we were after all.”

“The sky is pristine clear,” Tyler says with his eyes nailed to the pass, a shine of pure excitement showing off his eyes and pushing down the sapped demeanor from before. They’ve taken a huge step closer to Zack’s trail, whom they’re hoping to find in Windhelm, alive and well. Feeling the high hopes getting a hold of the peasant beside him, Josh is happy to give an affirmative answer to Tyler’s wishes of crossing the mountains even today.

There’s no return anymore. Tyler will not rest until he’s found his brother, and Josh knows this. With their stomachs loaded with porridge, the abandoned lighthouse is left far behind like many things before in Josh’s life. With his map marked with finer details, the two foreigners to the northern terrains of Skyrim approach the unknown.

At the other side of Mt. Anthor wait the fairer roads, the capricious terrain easing with crossing the borders of the Holds. They’ll make it shortly back to the vastness of the Pale and reaching the border of Eastmarch, where the City of Kings and the guardian of the northeastern Skyrim rises.

They wave their way down, and then up again, so high up in the mountains that the sight of sea pales beside the snowy lands they’re surrounded with. It’s brighter up here, the cold pit and its shadows formed by the ice are overcome by hard work with no one to miss them here.

Tyler wouldn’t do it again, swearing his words through the grey stones. It’s still cold, of course it is, but knowing that they’ve made it this far is a reason good enough to keep moving and feel victorious about it. And the towers, they rise over their heads like a trophy for their doings now, short shadows casted at the root of their boots, crushing the crystal snow beneath them.

Having a closer look, they’re more like ruins. What’s left of them turns out to be an aged tip of an entire fortress, still connected to the main structure that is now taken by the frigid nature and its freezing greed to swallow everything up. Josh can easily step on one of the rooftops from a landing of ice clinging to it, leveled equally. The crook of his arm goes around the pole as he twirls around it in a quick dance, before Tyler pulls him back from his left one, worry in his voice as he wants him back on the steady side. Josh laughs.

Three hawks circle high in the open air over the pass, cutting the blue sky in white flashes as the sunlight hits them. Laughing free and wild, Josh pulls to a stop with Tyler beside him, far below the wind under the hawks’ wings as they face the open mouth of the pass, now yawning wide open in front of them.

Wind howls its way through the passage of it. It’s the final push to the other side, the steep hill rising with the rocky walls of the pass, cutting the mountains around it.

“Finally,” Tyler sighs in a deep alleviation. “I’ve been waiting for this moment.”

“For how long?” Josh asks, looking at Tyler shed his hood and living every passing second, breathing them in.

“All my life, probably,” the peasant says, low with the utter power that the anticipation gives him.

Josh nods, following him in. However they’re not given much time before their talking attracts someone’s attention. Having made it nearly to the top, Tyler startles at the sudden intrusion on their open-ended way to the other side, taking in the men getting on their way.

Three shadows emerge from the shelter of the pass. They spread out to block the narrow way, two of them with their weapons drawn.

Josh frowns at the sight of them. They’re soldiers. Stormcloak soldiers. A sword, a bow, one of them has a battle axe on his waist. The latter is stepping forth, crossing his arms over his chest, and speaking-

“Halt! You’re passing through a toll road. If you want to go get to the other side, you pay us,” he says with a mighty voice as his aid. His blue cape is wrapped around his torso, leather straps and belts keeping the thing together. His face is filled with scars, old and fresh ones, showing his anterior experience on countless battlefields. With a sturdy chain mail as a shield that hugs his huge body, the man doesn’t seem to be bothered by its heavy weight. Thick boots and gauntlets equipped with black bear fur protect his legs and arms as equally dark hair covers his rocky face.

The two men behind him stand still, quiet. One of them is a young Nord, short and skinny like a scrubby tree on a cliff. His clothes are too big, like empty sacks they hang off his body, a belt with a hollow sheath and bony arm rest against his hip. Despite his lanky appearance, the boy stands like a man amongst the others with his sword out and thrown over his shoulder, writhing his mouth as if he’d be spitting his teeth out soon.

The third one is an old man, the roots of his long hair having sapped the color off and out. His hands are aged and pale, filled with loose tendons that slither on the back of his hands. His messy frost-eaten beard hides the countless wrinkles on his chin, but his eyes show the tiredness coming on by the old age— isn’t he too old to serve in an army?

The next words pull Josh out of his thoughts.

“What’s the matter? Pay up, citizen.”

“We don’t have any gold to share,” Tyler lies, but he’s not far from the truth either; a wise man should never carry too much gold with him, the risk of getting robbed or losing his life over it too prominent. They didn’t have much on them, it’s the truth, a reason good enough to hold on to. However their words don’t move the man in the bear fur.

“Bullshit. I can see from your clothes alone that you’re not the lowest snot that goes on and around begging for gold.”

“And what are you to tell us to pay so we can use the road? Since when has Ulfric Stormcloak become so poor that he has to harass ordinary travelers?” Josh asks with ice in his voice, calm like the rocky walls around them.

The soldier’s eyes catch on fire from the mention of the Jarl of Windhelm and the icy tone with it.

“Watch your mouth,” comes the warning thrown with spit. “You’re talking about Ulfric Stormcloak, the True High King!”

His words sound oddly foreign in his mouth, lacking the accustomed force.

Josh ignores his annotation.

“And how much is your charge?”

The dark man smirks with the faintest raise to his lips. “A hundred gold.” Low is the answer, and so is the the tone that Tyler speaks with.

“We don’t have that kind of coin on us,” Tyler says, growing impatient. “We told you, we’re just travelers. And we’re a bit in a hurry, so if you’ll excuse us…” He steps forth, but gets stopped when the dirty archer pulls his bow up, an arrow staring right between Tyler’s eyes, forcing him to stumble back.

“Hey!” Josh shouts and steps forth, throwing his arm between the two.

“I don’t like your tone, _travelers_ ,” the leader of the group says and clicks his tongue. “This is a clear order from the Jarl of Windhelm, and I’m not letting you pass unless I’m told to leave my post. And as far as I know, you might be lousy with gold.”

The encounter is heating up. So is the Stormcloak’s voice. “You’ll give us a hundred gold or we’ll cut your heads off.”

Josh’s brows sink low. That’s not a guard’s behavior at all.

Tyler wavers beside him. The motion kicks something off, and Josh remembers. He remembers the three stripped down bodies on their way here. He can see all the blood and guts in his eyes again, spread out like a feast of beasts as if to show the night’s terror to the broad sunlight.

The biggest of the men’s cloak is smudged in blood. None of their clothes are perfectly fitting. They carry no banners with them, and the weird protocol was too suspicious to be a real assignment.

There’s no dancing to their filthy game.

“You are no soldiers,” he spits with disgust. Tyler turns to look at him, bewildered by the sudden outburst. The burly man stares down at him, popping a joint in his neck as he twists his head, listening closely what Josh has to say.

And Josh, he smirks in disbelief. “You’re just a rotten mob of bandits who killed a group of Stormcloaks and plundered their stuff. I’m sorry to dawn this to you, but you’re idiots if you thought no one would notice,” he finishes and pulls an arrow from his new quiver, nocking it.

The opposing man with his bow is about to lose his temper and release the arrow, but his boss stops him, claiming the last words to himself.

Their lie is now exposed. The bandit laughs unbothered.

“You southern fools,” he growls. “Guess we have to take your lives _and_ your money.”

His words seal the deal.

“You’ll not leave this place alive. Go on, boys. Show me some blood.”

No sound comes off when the old man taunts his bow again. Josh is quick to shove Tyler out of the arrow’s way and leap to the other direction himself when the first attack rains down on them. Tyler falls, but draws his sword in an instant, getting quickly back on his feet and throwing his backpack aside to move freely. Bare steel is shown with a bright, silvery sheen to it as the sunlight hits the polished steel again. It’s the first time Josh sees it up close, but he has no time for peering. Sharp breath is sucked in, his lungs are filled with cold air and Josh’s left arm is already stretched out in front of him as his right elbow points behind him. With his finger as his arrow rest, Josh aims, quickly releasing the fletching.

The arrow flashes in the air with a whistle. It never hits the target as the aged bandit was ready for his first strike. The steel tip of the shaft hits the rocky wall clattering, but gives Tyler a chance for a counterattack, drawing the archer’s attention to him.

Quickly picking up the old man’s arrow, Josh sets it on the nock to return it before the marksman turns to face him again.

Josh is satisfied to hear the old man sing in a pained gnarl. The bandit’s own arrow is sticking out of his leg now, the steel having pierced his flesh loud and clear, its sharpness a pleasant surprise for both of them, Josh believes.

He feels the electricity of someone watching him then. Josh shifts his gaze, he turns to look, and his eyes lock with the big thug of the group who follows his movements, silently challenging him.

Josh feels for the next fletching.

He’s going to knock that smirk off his face.

Now further away from Josh, Tyler is challenging his own opponent that is still recovering from his fresh injury. Nervously pressing his toes against the bottoms of his boots, Tyler tries to stay calm. He’s used to clashing his sword with Zack, they used to spar together a lot, starting out with wooden sticks only to move onto real ones. They trained to get used to the feeling, to get the _grip_ of it, only to get scolded by their mother when she saw his two and only sons swinging at each other. She’d scream how she had no use for armless farmers, much less for dead ones, but their father didn’t mind.

He’s got the grip by now, yet today, it’s unsettled. His fingers feel thick and clumsy around the hilt, for this fight was real, the intention of killing strong in the air; it makes him nearly dizzy, the difference between kids’ play and today as sharp as the sword in his hands.

The blood soaking through the fabric of the bandit’s pant leg only makes it more real, the smell of iron wafting thickly about their senses. However with his enemy broken to ranged weapons, Tyler can breathe freer. The distance is enough to coddle him with time to think, but without a bow of his own, he can’t win. Forced to edge himself closer, Tyler inches himself towards the archer, step by step.

His nervousness must shine through his actions, but Tyler doesn’t give in to the adrenaline pumping through his veins, keeping himself from doing anything hasty as the wounded bandit picks up his bow again.

For now he has to concentrate on avoiding getting hit. It’s not a hard task, Tyler sees to his surprise, moving up the steep hill. Where steel is to pierce the air, Tyler is sure to avoid it. One arrow misses. The second follows it. Tyler adds to his speed, the skin on his face tightens as he pushes forward with his eyes firmly fixed on his bleeding opponent.

The old man loses his composure. He throws curses at Tyler’s way as he pulls the straining string back again. However his good leg knocks itself against the arrow as he attempts to back down. It works like twisting a knife in a stab wound, and the bandit jolts, grunting, not even succeeding to get it all the way back before letting go.

It’s a poor excuse of an attempt to take someone’s life. The amount of wasted arrows equals to four now, and the distance between them is only a shadow of its former self. Gnarling, Tyler leaps forward before the archer has time to do anything else. However the fear in the old man’s eyes cuts deeper than his sword, and Tyler’s muscles slow down in hesitation for a fleeting moment, giving the bandit enough time to jump aside.

Tyler slices the air, cursing. There’s no time to halt. So Tyler follows him, slashing the sword again to mislead the old one’s swaying steps. It works, and Tyler tackles him, changing the tactic. The bandit staggers and falls, down the hill, down the pass, his stolen armor too heavy for him to fight it and knocking him out amidst it all.

Tyler runs after him, jumping and sliding down the hill and stopping at the motionless body on the ground. Snatching a short sword tucked into a scabbard behind the bandit’s back, Tyler grabs it and cuts the string of his bow with it. Throwing it aside, Tyler releases a shaky breath, a misty cloud of his exhale a hot puff shoving its way out.

One down.

The old man is unconscious, temporarily out of the game. Tyler checks him without really thinking about it, yet Josh’s pained shout pulls his attention from his opponent.

Behind his back, the huge bandit chief has Josh pressed into the ice, his bow ripped out of his hands and thrown away, thick arm around Josh’s neck, cutting off his air. With his head pulled up into a spine-breaking twist, the thug is aiming to kill him without using his axe at all.

The bandit has a chain mail hidden under his clothes. Tyler can hear it chink to the tune of Josh’s struggling in his arms. Even from the distance, Tyler can easily see that his arrows have hit their target, but failed to deal any damage due to the thick steel.

Tyler’s eyes widen. Josh is in danger.

He gets up, attempting to help him out of his misery.

“Josh!”

A blade gets shoved to his throat. Tyler halts as if hitting a wall, feeling a small amount of blood starting its way down his collum as he reels back with two shaky feet. The young Nord that Tyler had already forgotten steps on his way. Skinny and beaten up, he’s younger than Tyler and wild from his eyes. His hair is shaggy and out of control - cut shorter with a knife, the ends hang unraveled and dry, giving him a savaged look. He’s as fearless as he looks, ready to fight and stand up for his group without a question. And Tyler looks, he looks at his opponent in a shaken up disbelief, the grip on his sword’s hilt wavers again as he hesitates to land the first blow against a child no older than sixteen.

“Get out of my way. I have no business with you.” Tyler gives a try with a firm voice, yet the boy huffs at his shaking words. A sharp set of eyes stares at him through the dark hair that hangs low on his face. The boy’s fingers tap against his own sword, blunt teeth flashing behind his cut lip.

“Don’ care man. You heard my boss. Who doesn’t pay us, dies.”

It’s enough to let he choice slip off of Tyler’s hands. The Nord lunges at him with fury. The cries of battle roar in the air as the bandit swings his sword in a quick, hasty manner, putting all his weight into it. Tyler tries to reach him with his eyes, however his attempts are doomed to fail as the boy gives him no chance. Their swords meet, steel snarls and screeches against each other where sharp edges lick at each other like serpents’ tongues, refusing to give in to the other.

The sound of steel talking echoes in the pass, drowning everything else beneath it. The rolling impacts start a tingling wave of electricity up Tyler’s arm. The dull ache is relentless, slowing down his movements. The fierce in front of him must notice it, for he pulls his sword back quickly, going for sinking the sword right between Tyler’s eyes.

The anticipation of pain rips a yell out of Tyler’s mouth.

But he blocks the blade. Tyler blocks it, and he yelps surprised, stumbling back as he’s forced to retreat. Tyler grits his teeth, throwing his back out as he falls lower on the steep hill. Tyler winces, using his sword to steady himself. He raises his eyes up higher where his opponent is standing, steadfast and still as winter.

Tyler cringes. He needs to think. He needs to find a way to restrain the boy or he has a stab to deal with for real, and it’s piercing his guts if he doesn’t come up with something and soon. Knocking out the archer was an easy task, but deceiving the young Nord was proven hard.

Tyler waits. Trying to even out his breathing, he looks for a chance to attack.

The Nord gives him no more time to rest. All too soon he’s plunging at Tyler, pursuing for his prey like a hungry pit wolf. The blurred blade is back again, making him dizzy— a long push like a spear flies Tyler’s way suddenly, he ducks to the side to avoid it, taking advantage of the boy’s flinging steps landing on his space. Staying low, Tyler flicks his foot in a spin and sends snow in the air, trying to push his opponent off his feet again. However the young legs aren’t as clumsy as the old ones, and the armed boy jumps, slashing his sword at Tyler’s shoulder and almost hitting him again, _almost,_ but Tyler is quick to escape the strike, his success yet another surprise for both of them.

Tyler gasps, having to take his distance and losing his own balance at the sharp fall of the terrain again.

 _“Fuck,”_ Tyler curses out loud, breathless, helpless and losing. Wiping his face with his other hand, Tyler gets up to stand his ground despite his badly aching muscles. The bandit does the same, pulling his sword back up. The narrow failures of missed blows are enough to bring a dark smile on the young man’s face, who keeps staring down on him, laughing as if he had already won.

Nothing can irritate him more. The sight takes Tyler back, no farther than the late summer in Rorikstead. He thinks about Zack and his chaff face he’d use to wear whenever he succeeded to blindside his older brother during one of their duels. In his eyes, Tyler sees his younger brother, he really does, and can’t help but think how all this mess is Zack’s fault in the first place.

The frustration that’s been coiled for months starts to unravel, making his blood boil. Tyler gets angry. He wants nothing but hit his brother in the face and pummel him until all the shit he’s been through because of him gets paid back. However he has a fight to finish. A fight where his position is very, very disadvantaged. He needs to get a better stance, the upper hand, or there will be no punches to deliver.

The marauder in front of him is teething his lip again. The bare bones of his mouth cut a scab on his lip and pinch out blood. Tyler catches his breath.

His mind is blank of ideas like the depths of an abyss, yet somehow, Tyler finds himself moving. This time, he goes to face the Nord himself. The bandit is ready for him; the dark blade rises and falls. The boy jumps, his sword coming down in a savaged arc. Tyler swings his sword with both hands, stopping the strike that comes from above. Their blades catch below and above, and Tyler pushes, stepping aside with their swords running against each other.

Tyler circles to his opponent’s right. The boy turns to follow him, swinging blindly, but the reach is not given unless he jumps to close quarters. His sword is shorter than Tyler’s - it’s then when he sees it; another thrust of his blade comes, and Tyler slams it aside instead of dodging this time, making the Nord stagger aside, his thick, dark hair falls and covers his eyes, narrowing his vision for a split second.

Tyler sees his opening. And he uses it.

Frantic, he springs forth while the bandit is still stepping backwards. Feverishly searching for his foe, the bandit can only wrench a splinter of cold air into his lungs, too late as he catches the dark shadow rushing towards him.

The boy slashes with his sword, finding an empty spot. Tyler has already ducked down in an instant and thrown himself on the ground, getting quickly back on his feet and avoiding the blade just in time. He spins around just as quickly and screams, gripping his sword with both hands and slashing it against the younger‘s leg with a wild, hysterical strength.

The blade pierces the flesh as easily as it pierces the leather. It cuts the muscles in half. A bloodcurdling scream fills the air, red oozes on the white, raining, and a broken body lands on top of it.

Tyler takes his distance again, and keeps it. His pale blade has just taken its very first tasting in blood, the proof cast with an iron seal that carries itself up to the fuller, coming out with a slick sound.

Tyler’s hands shake uncontrollably, the blade nearly falling to the ground entirely.

It went so deep.

A heavy lump sinks into his stomach and urges acid into his mouth. One after another, Tyler takes a step back, dragging his sword against the north as his heart hammers in his ears. The time slows down, and all of sudden, the blade felt heavy in his hands, the steel doubling its weight with no mercy. The grip on his sword is slick with sweat. It burns his hands. Yet there still lies something else that sets his mind on a higher blaze when the last echo of their swords dissipate from his mind.

 _Josh,_ Tyler remembers. _Josh!_

Tyler faces the other direction in panic. The bandit in front of him has turned the unconscious Josh onto his stomach, slamming his head into the hard surface, attempting to bust his skull. Tyler stops seeing around himself at the same time his hearing disappears behind a buzzing rapid in his ears.

Tyler sheaths his bloodied blade, grabbing the knocked out archer’s short sword instead and going to the man that is dead in his books. He sees red.

The man is too driven for his work, deaf of sounds as Tyler appears behind his back. The crud laughs wickedly, momentarily stopping to see the damage he’d deliver. And Tyler sees, he sees Josh’s bloody white face in the filth’s hands, he hears the man laughing, and feels how his jaw clenches in fury, molars creaking.

Wasting no time, Tyler brings the weapon to the thug’s throat before the bandit has time to react. “Let go of him. Your throat is in the open,” Tyler says with an eerily even voice, pushing his breathlessness down. “I’ll cut you down.”

The young Nord keeps moaning in the background, he’s bleeding painfully from his severed leg, unable to stand up and fight anymore. Tyler hears him, he does, and he hopes he’d managed to shut his face in some way.

There was no time. Now hoping that the pain will put the boy’s head to sleep, Tyler steadies his position, keeping his eyes closely on the brute’s jugular.

He needs to free Josh.

The thug dares a glance over his shoulder. He stares at Tyler with ice-cold look in his eyes, scanning his challenger up and down, and then up again. When Tyler doesn’t do anything to execute his words, the man pushes his own cheek against the edged weapon. The blade cuts the side of his already scarred face, and Tyler flinches at the sight of blood, startled by the unexpected move.

He takes an instinctive half-step back, swallowing gravely at his own dread and weakness to let his emotions betray him. A sense of threat closes around his heart, making his throat clench in distress.

The bandit gives an ugly smirk at his reaction. Without warning, he grabs Tyler’s blade, and Tyler can’t stop a gasp as he tries to pull it back and step aside in vain, too dazed to let go of the hilt. The thug’s grip is crushing, his hands are protected by starched bandages that save him from getting horrid cuts on his palms. Adamant, the action throws Tyler off guard, and the next moment the man is yanking him his way, wrenching Tyler from his hand and twisting his wrist as if to shatter it. Tyler groans in agony, the shortsword slips from his limp fingers, unarming the weapon out of his reach. And the thug pushes him, Tyler staggers and falls on his knee, watching in horror as the bandit rises to stand up himself.

His mere size is enough to paralyze Tyler. He stares up in fear, all his will to fight runs through his fingers like molten ice, leaving him unable to move.

He’s not given time to snap out of it. It’s like getting hit in the head with a maul. The thug’s fists are huge and tug Tyler back up from his collar before hitting him in the face repeatedly and beating him back to the ground with a single thumping punch and a kick in the stomach. The force of ruthlessness throws him back for several feet; like a rag doll Tyler’s body rolls down the steep slope as he struggles to get a hold of the slippery ice. Everything around him is just a blue-gray mess, cracking his head against the hard coat over and over again as his sword strikes bruises on his hip.

Snow pools behind his back when he comes to a halt against a dyne of it. The white whirls in the air as Tyler writhes on the ground like a worm in a hook.

He’s is still gasping for air when a dark shadow appears high over his head, and goes on to gob on him. The spit lands on his face; Tyler doesn’t register any of it when nothing but full blown terror has taken over his body, having no sense of a steady ground beneath him. Like a kaleidoscope his head spins, his vision is doubled or four-folded, Tyler can’t tell. He tries to scramble away— the loose snow doesn’t let him have a grasp on anything, and Tyler slips, getting nowhere. The air is not available anymore, he’s choking on the void in his lungs, just slipping, dying— they’re going to die!  

Tyler yelps like a bleeding stray dog when the bandit suddenly presses his heavy boot against his rib cage and starts to put his weight on it. Tyler can only convulse in a scorching pain, unable to even scream as his bones press against the ice-cold ground, bending under the pressure. The onslaught does not recede, and the man smirks dirtily at his rattling bones and choking noises, leaning forth before suddenly pushing up, driving all his weight up and down, sinking it into his side.

Something inside him dislocates. Such sound has Tyler never heard before in his life, but it’s coming from his insides now. With a horrid crunching sound explodes the pain behind his eyelids— it flashes in white and then in red, black dots taking over his vision, so hot that it seizes his muscles to constrict. Twisting his body in a painful suffocation, Tyler croaks breathlessly, his vision whiting out as all the air leaves his body, striking him down.

His head wrenches back, wide eyes blinded by pain. Feeling as if getting cut in half, Tyler throws his arm out violently, slashing aimlessly. It hits the bandit’s leg on top of him, and Tyler claws, rips and pushes to get the slicing force to free his innards, bloodied and screaming and pleading to no one in particular as his body loses its strength to fight. But the force on top of him doesn’t budge, only driving the sharp heel deeper in, feeding his panic.

Another crunch carries from his ribs, and Tyler feels himself losing consciousness, lungs pressing into a bloody pulp. However the pain brings him back, it tortures him, doesn’t want to let go of him, and he can only curl around his wound to helplessly protect himself from any further harm, ripping his hair off to hold on to something, anything.

Fearing for the next blow, Tyler jumps with his heart beating in his throat when the bandit chief opens his mouth again.

“Don’t you fucking interfere, shrimp. I’ll kill you next.” The man above him bellows. Tyler’s ears are ringing. He can’t make out the words, yet the tone makes him flinch, thick tears running down his face as he fights to keep quiet, completely crushed under his defeater.

Slowly, the man releases him and steps away heavily, eying coldly down on his petty opponent who keeps shrieking for breath in short, cut gasps. He turns around slowly, before abruptly stopping. “On a second thought,” comes the sneer, before the thug turns again. “Hjalild! Kill this milk drinker off for me. A true Nord ought to finish the battle he’s already started.”

Nothing happens.

“Boss, I can’t get up,” comes the troubled answer at last.

A growl. “Are you fucking kidding me?”

“He got my leg, boss,” the boy says with a trembling voice, clutching his slit leg, the bleeding unhalting and running through his fingers.

“Fuck the Sovngarde with you. Do I really have to do everything myself? HUH?”

No one answers.

“Kill yourselves,” their leader tells to his followers.

With that, the thug turns back to Josh, and Tyler’s bleary eyes can barely see him approaching the defenseless man with heavy, determined steps, ready to deliver the finishing blow.

The crud draws his battle axe. The sound rips a sob out of Tyler’s bleeding throat.

“Don’t,” Tyler pleads to the blue-blind sky, powerless, useless. “Don’t.”

Just one word, yet the world ignores it. Just one word, and the horrid cloak of silence falls over the battlefield. Tyler doesn’t know what’s going on, he doesn’t know anything about anything. His muscles contract tightly, urging him to get up, yet betraying him all the same. It’s no use. This is it. The bitter end of the line.

It’s like the ground beneath him would quail at the heavy realization of never making it to the other side. Tyler’s body won’t stop shaking. The last thing he sees are the lumps of ice shaking with him— right before his blurring eyes. A frown creases his sweat slicked brows together before his body painfully constricts for one last time, forcing his back to arch and mind to fade, sending a tidal wave of boiling agony into his spine as the black lack of oxygen seizes him, fainting at last.

Josh’s time is running dry by every step that lands closer to him. The thug steps over him, pulling him up and bringing the sharp blade to his throat.

“Time to die, hero.”

It is then when a tearing sound reaches the group, bringing a halt to the senseless bloodshed. It blares through the pass, a horrible cry that unsettles every man standing. The bandits turn their surprised gazes upwards, all the way to the top of the passageway.

The biggest of the men has Josh’s hair in his fist, yanking it up and ready to slit his throat, but the newly enclosing threat has him stopped.

They wait silently, seeing nothing. Then, a shadow appears, quaking the world at its arrival.

The bandit chief of the men following him is the first to get his voice working.

“Fucking Oblivion,” the chief with the shaggy axe says as he stares in front of him. “What’s gotten into that?”

A raving mammoth pushes through the narrow tunnel of the pass. It pounds its huge body against the rocky wall of the mountain, shattering crowns of icicles at the ceiling of the tunnel as its stomps. Four sallow tusks carved with bizarre sigils curl in front of the beast’s face, striking their surroundings with a force that is enough to detach icy boulders from the mountain sides, cracking to pieces, the vile animal wild and enraged for whatever reason.

The narrow tunnel cannot hold it down. The creature pushes right through. Its icy fur barely moves at its pace, hardened and rugged by the icy climate. Its snout rises towards the sky. A cry full of fury reverberates, shaking the vast field of ice around them.

The mammoth knocks down a rocky column. The pieces fly on their opposite ways as the creature stares below with two haunted eyes. It doesn’t care what stands on its way. It rumbles down the narrow passageway at once.

“Shit, it charges right at us,” the unarmed archer says, raising back to his feet and snapping the arrow in half as if the earlier was nothing.

Tyler awakes to the circumstances then. Still struck by a dizzy spell, he heaves his nauseous head up from the ground, nearly passing out again before meeting eye to eye with a creature he’d never seen up close.

It takes a moment to realize that it’s coming right towards them. The sight makes his spine quiver. Like a chilly finger it traces a path up Tyler’s aching bones before taking a grip on him, urging him to safety. As if a lightning bolt would hit his brain, Tyler finds what little strength he has to move, and drags himself to the side with struggle. His face twists in pain that drains off the color; something inside him is broken, Tyler knows, he can barely breathe but he makes it, covering himself against an imprint on the walls. Leaning his back against it, Tyler pants hysterically, sitting up to see the chaos unfurl right in front of him; the mammoth is still feral, racing down, rousing a blizzard at its tail and roaring.

They’re all in danger. There’s no placating the giant, much less to stop it, and the realization puts an end to their fight.

“We’re getting out of here!” the leader bellows, throwing Josh on the ground, his body slumping against a rock.

The bandits bolt away, hastily running down the slope. Tyler follows their path indecisively, curled up against the wall and clutching his blazing side and desperately trying to see if Josh was out of the mammoth’s way.

He expects them to lift the young boy from the snowdrift. A scream proves him wrong. Cowards - the lowest filth Tyler has ever witnessed - run away, leaving the crippled boy behind to salvage their own skin. The boy stares in disbelief, raising his blood-dripping hand to grip the archer’s pant leg, only to scoop the crisp air. The two men run screaming, cursing, praying to make it out of the gorge of ice, acting as if they didn’t hear their comrade calling for them.   

“Hey! _Hey!”_ the boy screams acutely. “Don’t leave me here, don’t—“ he sputters, before glancing over his shoulder. His whole body spasms when he notices how close the giant animal was getting; a gasp, the curses seize the lad as well as he claws at the ice, his panic taking the best of him and pulling him into its paralyzing clutch. The boy was stuck on a tight spot, unable to roll to the side to avoid getting on the beast’s way.

Tyler’s eyes run between the two, the distance grows shorter, faster.

“No,” Tyler outs under his breath, realizing that the Nord couldn’t get up. “No!”

Tyler springs forward. However a clutch of pain stops him at the sudden movement, and his knees buckle beneath him. Tyler falls forward, fisting the ice and hearing his bones cracking from the impact. Tyler twists in pain on his stomach, fighting for strength to get up, but he can’t move. Another scream reaches his ears, and Tyler lifts his eyes, suffused with the salt of his tears.

It all happens too fast. The Nord has himself thrown on his back, facing the mammoth that towered over him now. Weak with blood loss, the boy raises his sword at the giant. He clutches the hilt in a tight fist with his bony knuckles threatening to burst through the thin skin as a desperate attempt to protect himself.

The bandit refuses to look away. However his blade shivers in his hand, and at his last moment, the Nord turns his head away, eyes screwed shut, the honorless end too much for him to bear.

Regardless, Tyler screams for him, reaching out his hand, yet he’s too far away.

The mammoth stomps over the boy. The body bursts like a jar of jam, insides popping out with the sound of bones cracking into a million pieces, carving a bloody sigil on the pure white ice, some of the droplets hitting Tyler. Like shatters from a burning ember they scorch his skin, Tyler flinches, yelping, and shields himself with his arms when a rush of sharp flakes of snow hit him in the face at the beast’s passing.

The huge animal doesn’t slow down as it moves on, painting a crimson line with the blood and intestines that stick to its fur like a dirty paintbrush.

It’s stride causes an ear-wrecking sound that reminds Tyler of a legion of soldiers stepping as one. The clamor echoes in the dreary pass like a thunderous roar, shredding his eardrums to pieces, and Tyler can’t take it.

With the ice still cracking down his face, Tyler covers his ears and screams, pressing his back against the wall and kicking his feet as if to get away. Snow keeps storming in the air, scratching and cutting his bare skin and forcing his eyes to water and spill with thick trails of salt as if enough hadn’t been bled yet.

Through the hazy-blue clouds, Tyler can see the dead man’s eyes hanging on his face, bursted out of their sockets with long trails of blood destroying his young appearance. The crushed corpse is staring right at him, judging, swearing - cursing his name. Sensory overload, Tyler tries get air into his lungs.

He can’t. He blacks out again.

 

*

 

Josh is shaking him awake the next moment.

“Tyler!” he calls out.

Tyler wakes up with a flinch. The white, ruthless sky blinds him momentarily, he’s lying on his side, flopped down the cold rock wall and facing the heavy clouds that hang dissatisfied over their heads. His whole body is stiff from cold. Pins and needles, his legs respond leisurely to his commands as he tries to get back to his body.

Josh shakes him again. “Hey?”

The jostling hurts his head. Tyler blinks tightly. The air is still misty from the wafting snow that slowly but surely settles back on the ground. Buzzing, the pass feels isolated, disconnected from the rest of the world where no sound could reach.

Silence has taken over the feisty battlefield with no winners in it. The air feels heavy and crushing, they can barely move, yet the pain is a sign of life.

They’re alive.

Tyler huffs out in a splitting disorientation, spitting cold out of his mouth and off his lips. Josh is staring down at him, his face is filled with freshly bleeding cuts and scratches and bruises from the dagger-sharp ice that the bandit had smacked his head against.

His lip is spitting blood again. Tyler stares at it dazed, too slow to comprehend what’s happened.

It is Josh dealing with injuries, yet he’s the one looking worriedly at Tyler.

“Are you with me?”

His voice is so loud in his ears, sounding through the unending ringing. Tyler shifts his gaze to Josh’s knee in front of him. He tries to heave himself up, but is forced to grunt in pain as his rib cage reminds him of its existence with slicing pain beneath his fur coat. With the adrenaline wearing down, Tyler pales, hoping that the bones aren’t as broken as they feel. Unaware of Tyler’s fractures, Josh helps him for the rest of the way, handling him with less care than he probably should, Tyler bites down a scream— his head keeps spinning, feeding his nausea, and Tyler is not sure if he can keep that one locked inside him. He guesses he got a fair share of beating as well.

Josh carefully cups his jaw then, and swipes his thumb against Tyler’s face, a silent plead for Tyler to show himself and he does; Tyler’s left eye has swollen nearly shut, an inception of an angry bruise spreads out along the side of his head and onto his cheek where the bandit chief had hit him. Amongst it all is the blood, bright red yet dried up like caked mud. Josh eyes him painedly, cursing under his breath.

“The blood is not mine,” Tyler finds himself slurring without knowing the reason, and the words start a wave of trembles in his system when Josh pulls out a cloth and a dark bottle of something liquidy. Josh yanks the cork open with his teeth, it reeks of something strong. Hastily Josh brings it to Tyler’s lips, holding it up and asking Tyler to drink.

To take the pain away, Josh says. It can’t be taken away, Tyler wants to say, but gasps instead, shaking his head, knowing full well that he won’t be able to keep it down.

Josh doesn’t push him. He hands over the bottle and sets it down into Tyler’s shaking hands, telling him to drink it whenever he’s ready.

“Take it.”

Tyler does, keeping his eyes on the red bottle. Josh doesn’t say anything else as Tyler wipes at his tight face, the hand coming back with dirt and blood. Tyler looks at it and then at Josh confusedly, blinking repeatedly. Josh looks funny in Tyler’s eyes, his vision distorted. Perhaps he got a concussion as well. However he’s too dazed to pinpoint any clear thoughts when his whole body is screaming, the yelling stifling his coordination.

“Oh man,” he hears Josh say next. ”What in Oblivion happened here?”

Tyler’s body jerks, looking at his surroundings. He’s not sure why, but he feels a compulsive need to repeat his words, to say it so Josh understands.

“The blood is not mine,” come the words in a pained yelp.

Josh looks at him. He catches him when Tyler crumples. The bottle falls from his hands and spills on the ground and their laps, a small puddle grows as the liquid rushes out with a glugging noise.

Josh manages to pull it upright before every drop of it goes to waste, and Tyler’s upper body slams against his. Josh brings his hand up to his back to keep him from falling over, and Tyler’s chin goes to rest on Josh’s shoulder. And over his shoulder Tyler sees. And he remembers. How could he forget?

The dead will never forget him either.

“I killed a man,” Tyler gasps with a voice so hopeless that it makes Josh close his eyes and press his hand against the back of Tyler’s head, turning him away from the body’s way. Josh sees the bloodied footprints in the snow. He doesn’t have to guess what turned the tables today, he doesn’t have the time to think when Tyler nears a brink of hysteria in his arms.

Everything about Tyler shakes.

“I have killed a man!”


	6. Innocent Lost

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This drabble was originally meant to be in chapter five, but it would have made it way too long so I ended up separating the two... Hence it's a bit shorter, but I hope you like it in any case. Fus Ro Dah, happy reading.

It’s hard to get Tyler back on his feet after Wayward. Pulled into a shock, his legs refuse to carry him. Josh throws Tyler’s arm over his shoulders, trying to get him up. Combined with Tyler’s panic and his struggle against the touch, the stiff weight is heavy and keeps bringing them both down.

For better or worse, Tyler seems to faint for a fleeting moment yet again. Josh’s eyes widen as it happens; from one moment to the next, Tyler is gasping and convulsing like a newborn baby, only to drop dead right in Josh’s arms, as it seemed to him. Rigid to limp, the sight freaks him out, yet it was no time to freeze on his tracks.

Given a chance, Josh manages to heave them both up, carrying both of their loads and weapons with him. It’s okay. He’s done it before and he’ll do it over and over again if he must.

So he does.

From the heights of the top of the pass and steep downhill, Josh can see a faint shimmer of light pull his attention to the root of the mountain.

Nightgate Inn is their savior.

 

*

 

Tyler can walk. Josh sighs in relief when Tyler comes back to him, his hand reaching out for his chest. Tyler taps, weakly at first but growing stronger, wordlessly telling him that he’s stable enough to stand up on his own. As said, Tyler doesn’t talk when Josh asks how he feels. He swats Josh’s hand away and pulls his hood over his head to hide his bruises, but follows Josh silently inside the inn.

It’s quiet indoors, much to their wishes. Apart from them, only three men are occupying a table nearby the fire pit. They don’t pay any attention to them as the innkeeper serves them their paid meal. Putting the plate down, the bald man with dark beard and a blinded eye greets them with a grim look on his face.

Josh is not in the mood of any more shit. However the innkeeper is not as surly as he looks. He takes them in with a discreet joy, and shows them their room. Asking if they needed anything as if his hospitality was nothing.

Josh is just pulling his hand back after handing over the coin when the neighboring tables‘s words catch his attention.

“Aye. Marvelous creature. I’d drink for Hircine to see such a beast up close.”

“Go wash your ass in the river, Vilk. You drink in his name every day,” says the next voice.

“I’ll drink for that too.”

Josh recognizes that voice. He turns his head to take a better look at the small group of hunters that make merry of their ales right next to the fire.

“Vilkelm!”

The blonde Nord man is just cutting their chicken when he turns his head at Josh’s direction. His side-braided hair shines in the candlelight, but his smile glows even brighter when he sees Josh.

“Josh!” 

The man climbs to his feet, supper long forgotten. With a few enthusiastic strides, he crosses the hall to hug his friend. His grip is tight, as unyielding as his Nordic nature, and Josh refuses to fall back in force. The other men in the group stand up as well, encircling the two, unknowingly blocking Tyler out who staggers aside in confusion.

The man releases Josh. “You look good, friend!” Vilkelm touts happily and pats Josh on his shoulders. Then he frowns. “Except you don’t. What the fuck happened to your face, Josh? You look like a bloody Orc!”

The group laughs loudly. Josh pushes the tall man off of him, and joins the clamor.

“We had some trouble with a group of bandits on our way here. I guess the fight didn’t go that well on our part,” Josh says and one of the men snorts at his words, giving a cease to the ruckus.

“Bah, I hate those damned people. The rabble has gathered around the northern Skyrim for some reason. I don’t know what attracts them around Windhelm these days.”

“War supplies, maybe? The carriages have delivered a lot of equipments during the civil war. Food, weapons... They can beat a small group of soldiers if they have the element of surprise on their side. I guess the northern army should stick to cargo ships…”

The conversation goes on and on. They stand in a thick circle, endlessly throwing different topics at each other. It’s Vilkelm who finally realizes to cut the talking out, only to make a proposal.

“Why are we still standing here? You should join our supper! We’re sharing a nicely fattened chicken and big tankards full of ale. Your companion is obviously welcome too.”

Fuck. Josh didn’t even realize.

“Oh! Of course. Tyler, come say hi to my—”

Josh’s face falls when his eyes land on an empty spot behind him. Withdrawn to their room, Tyler has disappeared without a word. The door to their room is closed, a feeble barrier drawn between the two.

Not sure how to interpret its message, Josh hesitates. Vilk sees it as he glances over Josh’s shoulder. “Oh… Do you want to get him?”

Josh bites the inside of his cheek. He turns back. “No… Sorry about that. I think he needs to get some rest. Our journey hasn’t been quite easy you see,” he explains, lowering his voice at the last part.

Vilkelm‘s smile returns. “It’s okay,” he tempers with a calm smile. “Hopefully we’ll get to enjoy his company later.”

They get seated around the table. The fire steals the last of the chill from Josh’s bones, allowing him to relax. As Vilkelm had promised, a tasty chicken was waiting for them. Not a single piece had been cut off yet as a sharp knife juts from the roasted bird’s side as Vilk grabs it once again, resuming his previous task.

The two men with Vilkelm introduce themselves as Kelbarn and Gunlir that Josh hasn’t had the pleasure to meet before. Constantly bringing new people in, the group of hunters have many stories to be shared. Josh mostly talks with Vilk for he knows him the best, but his ears catch on the other two men’s conversation, and Josh’s interest perks up at certain words.

“What did you just say? What about the mammoths?”

Gunlir stares at him with perplexity. With his mouth full of food, he hurries to mash the meat with his big teeth and wash it down with warm ale.

Kelbarn takes over when he starts coughing violently.

He hits the other man on his back. “We were talking about the yearly trekking of the giants and their herded mammoths. They live in these camps, as you must know? It’s just that their settlements aren’t always permanent. So they do some wandering, traveling through the Holds and trying to find a place to start living in again. They can stay on the move quite some time, sometimes, moving here and there, stopping only when a right place is finally found. It’s nothing interesting you know.”

Gunlir comes back into the conversation. He knocks his fist on the wood.

“This year was different.” Gunlir chews the last of his chicken and spits out a spike of bone on the table. “I told you. One of the mammoths had lost its herd and gone ransacked. I saw it rushing on the main road just this morning. It was knocking down entire trees. A sight to see, though I hope no one had face it. The mammoth had gone mad like it was the gods’ work entirely.”

Ironically, the inn’s walls were stacked with huge skulls of the said animal. One of their tusks hangs above Josh’s head, these hollow eyes all around them keeping watch on the men. The fire blazes and the wood pops in the fallen silence, filling it up, painting the ivory shade with an odd sense of fury.

Josh puts his drink down as he stares upwards before going to speak. “We might— I mean Tyler, my companion, might have seen it too. In the pass, where we came from earlier today.”

“Are you serious? That’s where they make their way every time. Shit, that place is dangerous this time of year,” Gunlir curses, teething his tongue.

Kelbarn agrees. “The Hold should send some guards to keep an eye on the entrances, but… pfft. As if they had any resources for it right now,” he says, downing the last of his tankard.

“Did you see the mad mammoth yourself?” Vilkelm asks with his eyes curious. He leans his elbow on the table, getting closer to Josh.

“No, I…” Josh trails off again. “I only saw its footprints in the snow. I’m sorry,” he explains, passing over the whole story.

“What, were you taking a nap or something?” 

The group laughs, and Josh laughs quietly with them, taking a careful gulp of his ale.

Suddenly, Josh feels eyes on him. He turns to look, and sees Tyler peeking his head to the main hall with half of his face showing. A tender hand on the scaling off wood, Tyler’s restless fingers press against it. His gaze is pleading to Josh. Silently, Josh raises his eyebrows at the other, asking him if something was wrong. But Tyler just stands there, staring at him, before gulping spasmodically and receding back to the room.

Josh gets up.

“I better go check up on Tyler. Hold on,” Josh says hurriedly before anyone can cut him off, pulling one leg out from under the table before the other, his boots landing on the stoned floor with silent thuds. 

He goes right to the door, and doesn’t knock. He’s gotten his invitation.

Tyler is sitting on the bed. Shirtless, the peasant is limply holding his cold hand against his side where a black bruise was spreading its kingdom like a vile pest. Silently, he raises his lowly bowed head, and with his only open eye Tyler stares at Josh with the blood still on his face, his clothes a miserable pool around his waist. 

A wooden bucket rests at the root of his feet. A pinching smell reaches Josh’s nose then.

“I threw up,” Tyler simply says, acid burning in his voice.

Josh closes the door.

He steps closer. “Show me that.”

Tyler turns away, hiding. “I checked it. No broken bones.” Tyler speaks shortly as if to make sure that he gets the words out without having to stop.

Josh halts. “Do you want me to get some ice for you?” 

Four candles sit on the nightstand, only three of them aflame. Tyler’s fingers curl in their light. With his shaky voice and jerking shoulders, Tyler outs,

“Would you do that for me?”

It comes out as a choked whine. He’s in pain. Tyler’s breathing is short and shallow, a thin veil of cold sweat gathers around his back and shoulders as he fights to avoid expanding the cage of his ribs too much. 

He’s also lying. Josh can recognize a broken bone when he sees one. In this case, there’s three of them. Considering the amount of shaking, the level of pain must be unbearable and remind of its existence at every breath Tyler takes.

And Josh, he nods as yes, he says it out loud too as he grabs the bucket and promises to come right back.

He leaves the room, throwing a tight smile on Vilkelm’s group’s way and getting an understanding nod in return.

The cuts on Josh’s face pulsate as he washes the container in a nearby pond. He cracks lowly hanging icicles into small pieces and gathers hardened snow on the ground around the inn. Slipping them into a cotton bag, Josh fastens the string and ties it into a knot.

Suddenly, he’s not feeling so good himself.

He takes the parcel to Tyler who’s barely gotten laid down on his back. Josh shakes his head when Tyler attempts to take the bag from him. He hushes it’s okay, and moves his hands aside, shifting closer on the edge of bed and taking a closer look at Tyler’s ribs. Tyler gulps. He’s dreading the touch, dreading the pain, but lifts his arms out of the way anyway.

The outlines of his ribs show themself in red bizarre markings against his heaving, blackening skin. Tyler’s still struggling to breathe normally when the cold bag comes in contact with his swelling side. Quietly, Josh repeats it’s okay and goes to hold it for him, carefully pressing it against the growing hematomas. Slowly, Josh shifts it, turning and moving it as many time as he must if it’s to alleviate Tyler’s pain.

It’s not enough. Tyler’s writhing face shows his struggle to keep quiet. With his mouth a twisting line below his nose, Tyler throws his arms over his eyes to hide his shame behind them. As if admitting the truth to himself only then, Tyler gulps again, and utters,

“They’re fucking broken,” he confesses abruptly and sniffles, knowing full well that his lie has exposed itself. Tyler throws his head up, carefully following Josh’s hand moving over his body. Tyler trembles, gnawing at his lip. The longer he stares, the more the sight seems to upset him.

They’re stuck. The thought shows itself clearly on Tyler’s face, the dawning creeping in through every passing second. The peasant’s heavy head lowers back against the pillow, breathing growing heavier, but he can’t let that happen. Tyler huffs, trying to keep his lips sealed with his teeth, but the words keep coming out anyway.

More than that, Josh didn’t expect Tyler to start apologizing.

“Sorry— I’m so sorry,” Tyler whimpers, still refusing to break the dam as it fights to break him. Josh sits silently, thrown off, wondering what Tyler meant by his words, or who he was apologizing to.

Josh hopes Tyler is not blaming himself. There’s nothing they could have done to avoid getting into the fight. Not even withdrawing would have kept them safe, these outlaws never have room for negotiation— the bandits would have attacked them anyway, and left their remnants for crows. Having understood this, Josh knew that the battle could only end in some party’s death. Of course, he feels gutted for his piteous ability to help Tyler, and he was more than shocked when he found Tyler’s beaten up, unconscious body next to the crushed form of a man beside him, and Tyler’s terror after it.

Josh frowns. He didn’t realize they had gotten Tyler so bad. They needed more medical supplies, potions to trick their brain to wash the pain away, or even a healer. Finding a mage in the current circumstances was nearly impossible, Josh knows this. Having no skills in the art of magic, they can only take what’s given to them, the pain a constant reminder of it.

But what wounds Josh the most is having to see Tyler like this. He shouldn’t have left him alone, shouldn’t have let him wait this long.

He made a wrong move when he thought that Tyler needed to be by himself.

Having nothing else to offer, Josh takes the earlier potion in his hand and pops the cop open with his thumb. Tyler hears it fall to the floor, and shifts his teary eyes to meet Josh’s. He shows the small thing to Tyler.

“Do you think you can drink it now? It’ll ease the pain, and help you to catch some sleep.”

Tyler opens his mouth, chest heaving before words can come.

“Yes,” he says, nodding brokenly. “Yes,” and Josh brings the red bottle back to Tyler’s lips for him to consume, helping Tyler to lift his head as Tyler can’t sit up.

There’s not much left. Half of the potion got spilled on the ground after their battle at Wayward Pass, the bottle emptying in a few gulps. Tyler is instinctively trying to suck every last drop from it, breathing harshly through his nose and gasping desperately as Josh pulls it back when the bottle has nothing to give anymore.

It’s all they have. Hoping that the potion will still have some effect, Josh puts the bottle on the wooden nightstand while the shadows casted by the candlelight deepens the creases on Tyler’s pained face as they wait.

The sound of footsteps echoing through the main hall reaches their ears. It’s only the innkeeper brooming the floors, but for some reason, the sound upsets Tyler. His eyes shoot open. He looks at the door with his eyes wide, paling as if a _draugr_ would step through it. The peasant seems like he wants to tell something, but doesn’t know how. The words are right there, but if they break free, so do his tears as the fright flames itself alight. And Tyler fights it, but the growing pressure only adds to his misery, up to the point Josh wants him to scream it out.

Josh looks at the door confusedly, then back at Tyler. “Tyler?”

“I didn’t want this to happen,” Tyler finally vows, unevenly, covering his ears as if to close out a siege of swords throwing ruthless accusations at him, helpless against them. “Josh, you have to believe me. Please believe,” Tyler pleads, shaking his head. “I-I don’t… want…” is the last audible thing Josh can hear him say. His voice gets barely out there, a whimper reduced to a tight string. Tyler crushes his head between his arms, sharp elbows pointing towards the dark ceiling.

It must be the shock doing its talking, Josh realized. He cleansed Tyler’s vomit himself, which indicates that Tyler must be suffering from a concussion. He’s not making any sense.

“I know, Tyler,” Josh says regardless. “It wasn’t your fault,” he confirms, but his words cause nothing but an immediate, bitten down sob escape the peasant’s mouth. Tyler keeps his arms locked around his severely bruised face, but the long trails of salt pour past his crumpling ramparts, wetting his ears.

He doesn’t believe him at all.

Josh goes back to turn the cold-filled bag in his hands, icy water starting to weep through the fabric. He wants to reach out and swipe Tyler’s tears away until they stop coming, but touching him might alarm him even more.

He has no wise words for his friend. Feeling powerless and utterly unsure of the right thing to do, Josh offers the only solution he can think of.

“Sleep, Tyler. It’s going to be okay. Just try to get some sleep.”

“No,” Tyler whines. “You don’t understand,” he protests, but he’s too slow. Josh is already up, going to his own bed and fetching the spare covers there.

He hopes it’s not too heavy as he tucks Tyler in. However the peasant doesn’t seem bothered by it. It’s like the furs finally settle him against the hay-filled mattress, seeming to hold him down, and Josh starts counting the seconds until the blackout.

 

*

 

It takes a moment for Tyler to calm down, but eventually, he seems to have fallen asleep. Josh stays by his side even after it, carefully shifting on the edge of bed to keep the peasant undisturbed. Through the passing hour, Josh listens to the main room empty from visitors, steps echoing down the hall and the wind howl outside, the adamant draft making his muscles twinge again.

Propping his head against his hand, Josh eyes Tyler’s poor condition worriedly, wondering whether they can keep going. As beaten up as they are, heading out and taking the road was too dangerous in their current situation, even though they were getting close. Sitting here today, Josh can’t help but go back to his earlier thoughts, starting to second-guess all the decisions he’s made during their journey for them - whether the path he chose was the right one.

He wants to keep it rational, telling himself that there was nothing they could have done differently. However it doesn’t stop Josh’s mind from replaying the past day over and over again, up to the point he started to nod off exhausted as well, body jumping when his head lolls to the side.

Deciding to call it a day, Josh sighs and attempts to get up but halts when Tyler makes a move beside him.

Tyler is immobile until it happens again. It’s clear that he’s having a dream, head turning and feet moving beneath the covers. Shut behind closed eyelids, Tyler is in the middle of a nightmare. Forced to watch him face it alone, Josh can only bring his hand up and then down, tentatively brushing it against the rough fur that hides Tyler’s shaking body beneath it.

The touch calms the restless, and Josh shakes his head, feeling like a fool.

There’s no second thought about it. They’re gonna stay here for a while.

 


	7. The Unnamed Grave

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is important to me.

Josh is aiming at a snow white deer drinking from a pond of fresh water when a distant sound reaches his ears. It seeps through his surroundings like thick, hopeless water mixing into his visions, confusing him, wresting his concentration. It makes him halt and loosen the string on his bow, raising his head from his hide to hear better. Listening closely, Josh waits for the moment to pass, but it never does. Instead, it gets clearer - and louder. Then it’s real, and Josh finds himself being pulled out of sleep by the neck like an aberrant spring lamb, he’s awake, he’s sitting up-

And Tyler is crying.

Tyler is just getting up, attempting to leave the room when he notices Josh’s figure sitting in the dark, already awake, the sight making him collapse back on the bed and start crying harder.

Josh shoves the covers aside. “Oh, Tyler...”

Tyler screams into his palm, falling onto his side and punching the bed, biting hard into his own flesh to smother his cries.

Josh gets up to lit a candle. Sparks flicker, the fire ignites, and there lies Tyler, totally out of his mind. His eyes roll frantically in their sockets at the sudden light and bold shadows, screwing them shut and clawing at the mattress as Josh goes to him, trying to keep his sorrow locked up, but it’s too much. It’s too much.

“I-I can’t,” he chokes out with a strangled voice.

Josh crouches beside him, putting the candle down on the nightstand.

“Hey.”

Tyler shakes his head and wails, promising Josh that he’s gonna be alright as much as the violent sobs allow him. He curls his arm around his face, furiously wiping his puffy eyes on his shaking arm to make the tears go away, but they find no cease with nothing there to stop them from the inside.

Josh runs his hand against Tyler’s bare arm, trying his best to soothe the panicking man.

“Gonna be alright?”

Tyler nods hastily, salty water coming out with a wet sigh as he curls up into a ball and clutches his throbbing side.

“Ohh…”

Josh shifts the candle. “You shouldn’t move,” he says, keeping up with his other hand. Tyler nods again, quickly as ever, letting his tears fall freely. 

Josh’s nerves settle for the tiniest bit. “Still thinking about it?” he asks softly, even though he knew exactly what the attack was all about. He had to get Tyler talking, to clean up his troubled mind to get him away from the eye of the storm.

It’s hard, Tyler is gulping and heaving with his breathing, but he speaks, and he says yes, he’s thinking about it, for it’s all he can do and there’s nothing out there to get his mind off of it. He utters how he can’t get rid of the images, hiccups how the sound of a body bursting keeps coming back at him. His ears are still ringing, it makes him go insane, but covering them would only make it worse. Everything feels so fucking wrong and twisted; he’s taken away someone’s son, someone’s brother -  the thought makes Tyler feel disgusted, unable to deal with himself. 

“I know— I know I shouldn’t blame myself,” Tyler croaks, the boy flashing in his mind again. “But I am, and the spirit is constantly showing up in my dreams, chasing me down, and I woke up, a-and I saw him, Josh, I saw— he was standing at the door, he’s here to haunt me, and just— he just doesn’t let me _sleep,”_ he forces, gnawing at his fingers and starting to get agitated again; Josh squeezes his shoulder and tells Tyler to move over, and Tyler stares at him with his eye wide before clumsily scrambling back. The wooden bed is cramped with Tyler and the pelts already in it, but Josh finds his room, their legs are touching but that doesn’t matter - Josh has his arm around Tyler’s shoulder again and he squeezes, drawing the other close who immediately falls into the invitation. Tyler is still shirtless, the hair of his nape is standing up in a frightened attention as he weakly clings on Josh, tremors wrecking his entire body.

Josh pulls the covers back up, circling his thumb against Tyler who doesn’t budge, his head is hidden somewhere below Josh’s chin, and they hold onto each other, gradually calming down.

They don’t speak, actions taking over their words. Josh hears him exhaling through his nose, Tyler can breathe again and he does just that, concentrating on quelling the demon that is his own mind.

Long minutes pass. Josh can feel that Tyler is still shaken up, his shoulders tense, but it’s time to break the silence.

“I think you’re thinking about it too much. It really didn’t have anything to do with you, Tyler. I hope you get it.”

“I cut his leg.”

“There’s nothing else you could have done. They attacked us. We had to defend ourselves or they would have killed us.”

Tyler is quiet. Josh speaks again.

“If there’s anyone to be blamed, it’s his comrades. They left him there and saved their own asses instead of their friend. They should have died instead.” Josh takes a breath before continuing. “I wish I could kill them myself,” he says with seriousness to his voice, louder. 

Tyler takes a timid hold of Josh’s tunic. “Don’t say that,” he whispers, voice pale like fresh snow falling in an untouched forest.

“He was just a boy.”

“I _know,_ ” Tyler cuts him off, getting up on his arm and facing Josh. His eyes shine in the candlelight with post tears when he whispers, “ _I_ _know_.”

He’s so close. Josh gulps. Tyler stares at him with his eyes pink, one barely open, the salt of his tears irritating his bruised skin and leaving red marks like scratches on his cheeks. Josh pulls him back down, and Tyler lets him. Tyler puts his hands between the pillow and his head, seemingly hurt as he casts his eyes low, sniffling.

“It’s gonna be alright, Ty.” Josh tries carefully, unwilling to lose the game just yet.

“Sure. For us, maybe,” Tyler quips, still staring at somewhere else.

Josh sighs. “Exactly. We’re alive. We’re alive and well and we can keep looking for Zack,” he talks and almost brushes the short hair on Tyler’s nape, but pulls his hand back when Tyler meets his eyes.

“We’re not gonna find him.”

Josh frowns, taken aback. “Why?” he words gently and nudges slightly forward, pained by the other’s fading hope. They lie side by side, looking at each other silently. When Tyler doesn’t answer, Josh does it again. “Talk to me Tyler.”

“We’ve come so far. So much has happened, I- I just have this feeling that he’s not there anymore. If he’s even alive in the first place.”

“You don’t know that. We’re not in Windhelm yet, Tyler. But we’re close. I’m sure we’ll find the next clue there. If your brother’s letter was valid, we’ll find him in Windhelm.” Josh adds, “And you can punch him in the face when we do. I’ll hold him in place so you can smack his teeth in.”

Tyler smiles. It’s a rueful one, but it’s there. Overwhelmed yet putting his doubts aside, Tyler says, “Thank you, Josh. For everything. I feel like I don’t say it nearly as often as I should.”

“It’s fine, man. I know how you feel after all.”

At that, Tyler nods. He’s deep in thought and stares at Josh for a long time, until his face tightens as a yawn comes. He tries to push it down but it surfaces anyway, the constant lack of sleep taking its toll on him. He’s tired. They need to sleep.

“Alright. It’s a new day tomorrow. We’ll figure things out,” Josh promises and starts to get up, but halts when Tyler grabs his arm hastily, pulling him back.

“Stay,” Tyler says hurriedly, catching on his own words only after they’ve been said. His breath hitches. “If you want, I... It’s cold here.”

Josh smiles. He doesn’t think twice about it as he snuggles deeper into the bed, settling comfortably next to the other. Tyler’s eyes are already closed by the time Josh finds a good position beneath the fleeces. He fixes the hem of Tyler’s hide, making sure that every inch of his body was tucked into the warm cocoon of their shared bed before blowing the candle out and wrapping his arm around Tyler once again.

They get back to sleep before the eastern sky brightens up. Through the night, Josh can feel Tyler jumping in his sleep every once in a while, making sounds and fighting yet another fit of a nightmare. The twitches come and go all the way until they have to get up in the morning.

And every time, Josh squeezes him harder.

 

*

 

“Do you want to lay him to rest?” Josh questions three days later.

“Huh?” Tyler asks and ceases his writing, lifting the quill before it touches the paper again.

They’re sitting at the table, Josh facing Tyler as they ingest the first meal of the day. Well, Josh is eating. Tyler is swallowed up by wet ink again; he’s done a lot of writing lately, often withdrawn to his own world and barely leaving their room. Writing a journal is helping him to keep his thoughts intact, Tyler had explained it once, and this was no exception. It might not be as good as talking about his problems, but it was definitely better than doing nothing about it.

The beautiful thing about writing a journal has always been the moment he gets to read about his difficulties later on, Tyler had said. Empowering is the word he had used. The diary would lay out his struggles, but show that they can be beaten as well. But it’s not like the diary was dedicated to dark thoughts and the blackest of the seas only; Tyler wrote about good things, too. Really it’s anything that is on his mind the moment he grabs his quill and pops open the bottle of ink, the rush to write nearly addicting to him.

He hasn’t always been writing. He’s told Josh how bad he used to be at it, how he would forget all about it and find the poor booklet only months later or start a new one altogether when the fore one would be too proficiently hidden.

But he’d always come back to it. By now, watching Tyler write on his diary has become a routine for Josh. He’s learnt to spot the little differences between the varying weights of the things that Tyler wrote about by watching his face alone.

Sometimes, Tyler would be deep in concentration, eyes awake but otherwise gone, ignoring the world around him and writing until his hand started to ache and the candle would flame out, the words coming out as if on their own.

There were times when he’d be smiling, scrawling with a gentle raise to his lips. Those times were Josh’s favorites. Sometimes Tyler would lift his eyes and catch Josh staring at him, they’d hold on to the moment smiling at each other before Tyler would go back to his work again. At those times, Tyler wrote slowly and intuitively deeply. He might not write a lot, but every word was important, Josh could see it from his eyes alone, the sight making him happy.

Josh never really asked what it was that he was exactly writing about. It’s a journal, it’s personal, and he’s sure that Tyler wouldn’t tell him anyway. 

And now? Now those happy moments were far gone. Tyler’s thoughts certainly haven’t been light recently, and it shows at the heavy quill dragging around the pages even now. Yet right now Tyler wasn’t writing - he’s staring at Josh with his eyes red and puffy, hopelessness shining through his every feature, asking Josh to repeat his question. 

“You could prepare a grave for him. Maybe that would calm his restless soul and set you free as well,” Josh complies, reminding Tyler that there was still light at the other end of the tunnel.

Their days have been dark. The constant nightmares keep haunting Tyler, he’s sleep deprived and jumpy, constantly out of it and bursting into tears in the most unexpected situations. They were supposed to recover from their injuries during their prolonged stay at the inn, but they’re growing more exhausted all the same.

Tyler processes Josh’s words, slow. He goes to say something but stops before his words come, uttering instead,

“The soil is-“

“You don’t have to bury him in the ground. We could pick up boulders and build a stone tomb,” Josh offers, having pondered their options all nights while watching over Tyler’s sleep.

Tyler fiddles with the quill Josh had given him on their first day together, running his thumb through the soft feather. “Do you think it would help?”

“We should try it,” Josh heartens. “Maybe the spirit can’t find its peace and needs a concrete place to settle at in order to do so. His body remains, but that won’t last forever. Wild animals will move the bones and so will the weather conditions. He won’t stay there forever. Maybe the spirit is just afraid and clings on you because of it.”

Tyler stares at him with two sunken eyes, the swelling around his left eye having eased. Letting Josh’s words sink in, Tyler thinks. He’s quiet for a long time, his gaze jumping from one place to another. A rush of doubts quiver at the back of his head, making his heart hammer.

“What should I carve on the tombstone?” he asks finally, squirming in discomfort, the heavy weight of his question troubling his mind.

He doesn't know the name.

“It doesn’t have to come with a name. You could find his sword and mount it there. Maybe his weapon can talk for his name more than the one he received from his mother.”

A single tear trails down Tyler’s cheek. Moved by Josh’s sincere intentions, it runs over his broken, bruised skin, all the way down to his chin where it shivers on its place before falling down, disappearing from their sight.

And Tyler, he nods feebly. “I’ll do it,” he whispers. “I’ll prepare a grave.”

 

*

 

They go back the same day, spending the whole evening gathering heavy stones and carrying them in a sled all the way to the top of the pass. They’re shaking and sweating from the exertion but carry on, Tyler refusing the rest until the deed was done.

The dead was waiting for them when they had first arrived, undisturbed and curious why they’d come back. His crushed body was too fragile to be moved, so the grave had to be built on the exact spot where the youth had lost his life.

The setting sun has the world tinted with the vibrant color of orange now. Josh stands behind Tyler’s back as the other grabs a stone. One after another, his head is bowed low as he carries it to the right place. The sharp edges of the stones leave white imprints on his palms, heavy in his hands as he lifts them. Groaning in pain, Tyler looks nearly light-headed at times, but Josh can’t stop him. He stays standstill, breathing barely showing through the pale puffs of air coming from him, quiet as he follows Tyler’s every move.

Josh knows Tyler won't be able to move on if he doesn't get to do this. The sight takes him back to the very day he had met Tyler for the first time. He remembers Tyler’s fierce will to bury the body of a man he didn’t even know, and how upset he had been when he couldn’t - how there simply wasn’t any other option, emotions overdriving the common sense. 

It would have been a fateful night. Josh didn’t understand him back then, but he’s starting to fathom Tyler’s personality by now, the feeling growing stronger as he watches him from his very spot today.

Tyler is a gentle soul, carelessly thrown in the middle of cruel wilderness where the death was always present. Treasuring every human life, Tyler doesn’t want to harm anyone. It’s an honorable way to live, but prone to revenge itself in the most violent way possible.

The realization makes Josh worried.

Tyler wants to build the grave himself. Stone by stone it grows, reaching higher than the boy lying in it ever will. Tyler covers him thoroughly, as if to protect him from any further harm, tucking him into the safe of an armor made of sturdy sediment.

He finds the boy’s sword, buried in loose snow further away from the body. Carefully holding it in his hands and taking a closer look at the worn blade, the sight unveils its cheap shape; forged with sloppy hands, the steel is soft and full of cuts, cracked from places for too many times to count. It’s unbalanced and slightly crooked, starting to rust from places where the coating was already eroding. Either the smith was a drunk, didn’t know how to craft a proper weapon, or the boy had made it himself. Whatever the answer was, the blade had belonged to a young warrior who had died with a sword in his hands, defending the thing that he believed was right.

Tyler takes it to the boy.

He presses the head against the ground, holding it upright from the hilt with his other hand as he gathers stones and props the thing on them until it could stand on its own.

Lastly, Tyler ties a white flag on the pommel of the sword. It moves in the fair wind, gently raising and deflating before getting air under its wing again, pointing at west where the sun was gradually disappearing beyond the horizon. 

Tyler gets on his knees in front of it, bringing his hands up, up to his face, his left hand loosely curled around his right fist as he prays with his eyes closed.

And Josh watches him. Down on his knees, beseeching forgiveness, Tyler’s back is still turned to him as he devotes to reach the fine line between the living and the dead.

He doesn’t stay there for long. “I’m sorry,” is the last thing he says out loud to the departed, hoping that the spirit will accept his apology.

The ceremony is short and sweet with Tyler not wasting his time on unnecessary words that wouldn’t weight much in the one-way conversation anyway. He gets up with some difficulty, wiping his nose and turning back to Josh. 

Only now, the battle was truly over.

“It is done,” he says, sealing their effort, and Josh nods, knowing that they’ve done all that they can do.

“It is done.”

 

*

 

It’s dark by the time they walk down the hill. Josh holds a torch and eyes Tyler’s back with a hard eye. The peasant is walking in front of him, until he’s not. Tyler breathes loudly, slowing down as his frame starts swaying to the left, then to right as he tries to fix his balance but doesn’t pass the muster, sinking to the ground where the frost screeches beneath him. 

“Tyler, don’t do this to yourself!” Josh says with a pained voice at the same time Tyler gasps brokenly, showing his weakness to fight the gravity as his knees buckle. Josh knew it was going to happen eventually, but had no time to react. He can only crouch beside the other as Tyler gathers himself to a human shape again. The beaten man sits on his legs whimpering, holding his side where the pain pulsated the most. 

Josh puts his hand on Tyler’s shoulder. “Are you okay?” he asks, bringing the light closer.

“ _Yeah,”_ Tyler outs wincing. His breaths are hitching, even the cloud of his breathing a shivering ghost between the two. The second attempt comes out steadier. “Fine,” Tyler assures, yet he casts his eyes down to his lap to hide his anguish, his whole face grimaced in pain until the worst let go of him.

Josh squeezes him lightly but hard enough for Tyler to feel it through all the fur and leather. “Are you sure we should keep going? The inn is right there,” Josh says and points the torch at the building that stands behind the dark trees in the distance.

Tyler breathes. “We’ve wasted enough time because of me. We talked about this Josh. This morning and the morning we took the road. You promised to take me to Windhelm, Josh, you promised—“

“And I’ll keep my promise,” raises Josh’s voice. He can’t do it any other way. In his agitation, Tyler wouldn’t listen to him otherwise. He knows it, and Tyler knows it, yet the peasant’s startled eyes get caught up in Josh’s anyway.

Josh sighs.

“I’ll keep it. The city is at the end of the road. But we can’t keep going like this, Tyler. It’s too dangerous,” Josh says, worried what the path ahead might hide in its dark sleeves.

Tyler absorbs the words in silence before his eyes widen in realization. “I know,” Tyler says finally, ashamed and shying away. “I’m sorry. I know you’re tired too. And how I’ve been keeping you up at night, I’m-“

“That doesn’t matter.”

“It _does_ matter!” Tyler shouts then, losing his temper. Sad-eyed and heaving, Tyler comes down as quickly as Josh, his voice oozing with sadness now. The peasant breathes as hard as his broken bones allow him. “It does matter. Josh- I need to know that you’re okay too. This is not about me, has never been about me. But it was me who dragged you into this mess, and I’ll never forgive myself for it, but I’m— I-I can’t do this without you,” Tyler utters as tears rise to his eyes. “I need you Josh, I need—“ the last part coming out as a choked noise as tears burst out.

Josh puts the torch on the ground in confusion to wrap his arms around Tyler whose head presses against Josh’s shoulder, wailing.

“Please don’t leave me alone here,” Tyler pleads brokenly, scooping a handful of Josh’s short cape to hold him in place.

“Tyler, _no,”_ Josh says as he puts his hand on the back of Tyler’s head to keep him from shaking. “You got it all wrong. I’m not going anywhere,” he vows, squeezing Tyler’s shoulders to take a look at him, to say his words so that Tyler understands. “Hey? I’m here. We’re okay.”

Tyler draws in a loud wheeze of his tears.

“I thought you-“

“No, none of that,” Josh says and grabs the torch right before it starts slipping. “Have no fear.”

Tyler nods hastily, sweeping his swollen eyes on his sleeves and shaking his head in an exhausted gesture. “I’m— Sorry. I don’t know what’s gotten into me, this is not like me...” Tyler rambles, growing ashamed of his outburst. “I’m so tired,” he tries to utter, but an amused snort Josh has no control of pushes its way through his nose.

“You’re okay,” he says. “What about the inn now?”

Tyler runs his running nose on his shoulder. “I don’t wanna go there,” he says hastily, shaking his head. 

Josh’s smile falls. “There’s no changing your mind, huh?” 

“I don’t wanna lie in that bed again,” Tyler says louder, his voice rasping in grieve.

He wipes the remaining tears away roughly, sniffling. “Just a little bit longer,” Tyler pleads, before hurriedly voicing, “if you’re okay with it.”

Josh ponders their options, before nodding. “Okay. Just a little bit longer, but not a step too far. You’ve already overdone yourself, your ribs are broken, and you have to eat or you’ll never heal. And don’t tell me otherwise. You’re the thickest man I’ve ever met, you know that?”

Tyler snorts at the avalanche of words. He’s smiling with the last of his tears sticking to his eyelashes. “Sorry. I’m such a burden.”

“You are not a burden for me,” Josh says firmly, making sure that Tyler understands. A faint smile climbs on his lips before he says, “We’re friends, right?”

Tyler’s face falls at the sudden words. Wordless eyes, Tyler looks away instinctively, struck down by the inability to answer. He looks down at his legs as if to check if they can keep carrying him after all.

But he nods. Tyler nods, and his quivering gets to his voice when he says, 

“Right,” and Josh helps him up. “We really are.”

 

 *

 

In the night they walk, once again turning their heads towards Windhelm, the City of Kings and the capital of Eastmarch Hold. Today, their journey has been long but making no progress. Beside Josh, Tyler has fallen silent. He’s at his limits by now, impending to collapse at any moment. Josh knows this because he’s not feeling any better himself.

A rich white-water of Yorgrim River runs alongside their road. Its flow is strong enough to keep it from freezing where the mighty waterfalls rule the tides. It’s the river that crosses The Pale and Eastmarch from one another, it's the river where the tides merge from the White River before emptying into the Sea of Ghosts. The realization brings an odd sense of home back to Josh. Only now icy mist rises in the air, the swift wind leading it on and away, sticking it to tree trunks and forming breathtaking crowns of icicles on their branches, sharp and deadly were someone struck down with one. Such sight could never be seen in Riverwood where he's from.

They’re too tired to stay and admire the beauty of it. Putting one foot in front of the other they snail, hoping to find a place suitable enough to rest their aching bodies at.

They come to a mill. Two households stands on the opposite sides of the road. The windows glow with a faint sense of fire, yet are they void of any people, implying slumbering inhabitants. 

It’s no wonder. Who’d be outside in this freezing wind at this hour anyway?

“Should we knock?” Tyler asks, his voice dribbling with nothing but the utter will to do so.

“I don’t know. They might not open for strangers,” Josh worries, gingerly looking inside the house. An inviting fire blazes in the hearth of the main hall, embers waft into the flue in the same way ice flies in their faces outside. Josh bites his lip.

“Who’s there?” a male voice reaches them then. They turn around in surprise. An old man with a long cluttered beard approaches them from the shadows with a torch in hand. 

He comes in peace. “Can I help you?”

“Good evening,” Josh greets him. “We’re- uh…”

The Nord raises his torch, coming closer with a veil of curiosity in his eyes. His face brightens as the two come to the light.

“Ohhh, it’s you again! Did you forget something and came back?” he asks, happy wrinkles rounding his friendly eyes. 

He’s looking at Tyler. They don’t understand what the elder means. Tyler glances over at Josh and then at the man. “Sorry?”

“You’re back. Did you forget something or started missing my wife’s cookings already?” the man repeats, laughing off with a loud force that rattles the tattered wood around them.

“I’ve never been here before,” Tyler says puzzled, and the laughter of the old man with a thick grey beard and crooked teeth dies down. Ogling like an owl, the man closes his other eye to see better, taking his words back.

“Hoh,” the old one fathoms. “Could have fooled me right there. I was sure you were this youngster I helped out earlier. Looking for a woman, he’d say,” the man finishes and looks at Josh then, eyeing him up and down and earning a cocked eyebrow from him before turning back to Tyler, tilting his burly body to the side. He scans Tyler’s face deep in thought before nodding to himself and murmuring, “You have the same nose...”

Tyler’s eyes widen. He looks at Josh, then at the man, and back at Josh again.

“It must be Zack!” Tyler urges. 

“That’s the name!” the bearded man goes and claps his hands together, pointing at Tyler with a pleased grin and red, blunt cheekbones.

Tyler keens.

“H-he’s my brother! Where did you see him? Was he here? When did he leave?” Tyler is desperate, his hand grabs the big man’s shoulder, squeezing as if to juice a lemon for any further details.

The man moves the torch aside in confusion. “I’m afraid it’s been days for a month’s worth,” he appeases. “He came here, stayed for a week due to an injury. A nice man, helped to tend to the chickens and other household chores. I was ready to employ him but he had to hurry his way to Windhelm. For a woman.”

“A woman?” Tyler repeats, curling his eyebrows together. 

“She’s with child.”

Tyler’s face falls in stunner. He lets go of the Nord. Put in disarray, he doesn’t get a word out of his mouth. He’s confused, consumed by the sudden information, turning away to look at their destination looming in the dark. Josh takes over then.

“You said he was injured. What happened to him?” 

“Oh, it was nothing too bad. Just a strained ankle. A good few days’ rest and some easy walking around the barn and he was back to normal again, but he wanted to pay for our hospitality and stayed around to help.” 

“And you’re not lying are you?”

“Excuse me?”

“Josh, stop it. What would he profit from lying?” Tyler is back. He’s roaming his bag. Pulling out gold coins, Tyler takes a hold of the man’s hand himself and puts the septims there. “Thank you for your help. It means a lot.”

“I’m not a liar,” the Nord says seriously as he clutches the gold, yet understanding Josh’s concern. “There’s one more thing you should know. They came back. My wife met them crossing the bridge together, heading to west from here as they said. They were going to cross the mountains to get back to The Pale. It’s only been a week.”

Emotions taking over, Josh can see Tyler losing his patience once again. 

“Josh, we need to-“

“We can’t keep going in the dark any more, Tyler. You know that.” Josh speaks before the other gets to finish, shoving the facts in Tyler’s face.

“Josh, he’s literally in our grasp-!”

“ _They_ are, Tyler. All three of them. I know that. And if they have any sense at all, they’re not moving either. It’s too dangerous.”

Tyler quiets down. He turns his head away, bubbling with frustration. It spills over, and Tyler kicks a heap of frozen firewood set next to the entrance. The icy logs clatter on the wooden porch, rolling around until they come to halt.

Tyler’s shoulders rise and fall. It’s enough to vent his anger.

“You’re welcome to stay in our humble home,” the Nord proposed with a leveled voice. “We have always room for travelers.”

“If it’s not too much of trouble,” Josh says.

“Not at all. Welcome to Anga’s Mill.”

 

*

 

  
“Don’t let me sleep,” Tyler tells him with a voice of utter tiredness the moment his heavy backpack drops to the floor. “We’re leaving as soon as the sun rises,” he decides and unbuckles his belt to detach his sword and setting it down on the bed.

“There’s still plenty of time,” Josh says and enters the room at Tyler’s tail. “We can get some sleep before that.”

“I don’t even know if I’ll be able to do that,” Tyler says and gulps, warily eyeing the other bed in the opposite corner of their guest room. The place is cramped, a rambling old place, but they fit in. A big, stuffed head of a reindeer greets them upon their arrival, tiny lanterns of candles hanged up from its antlers. A sturdy pinewood nightstand separates the two frameworks, a carpet lies between them, and a good set of furs is set on top of the beds.

It looks inviting. Tyler wonders whether Zack has slept in the same bed.

The peasant sits down, opening his fur coat as he realizes how warm it is in the house, a nice change to the drafty inns they’ve been experiencing so far. It’s quiet, peaceful; the silence itself is nearly lulling.

Tyler fixes the bumpy pillows against the bedpost and scoots closer to lean his back against them. “With Zack so close… I’m too anxious to fall asleep.”

“Try anyway,” Josh says as he gets rid of his clothing. Pulling his tunic off and over his head, Josh smells his shirt beneath it and cringes. “By the troll, I wonder if we’ll be able to wash our clothes anytime soon…” He takes it off, changing it to a longer green one.

Tyler smiles faintly, watching Josh’s freckled back with his flexing muscles and his obvious struggle to find the right hole to get his head through it. Tyler turns his gaze away when he succeeds, Josh can see it from the corner of his eye— Tyler doesn’t want to get spotted staring this time it seems.

The peasant pulls out his journal instead. Taking the red lace bookmark off, Tyler starts a fresh page. For a while, it seems like he doesn’t know what he should start with, so he doesn’t. For a moment Tyler just stares, before grabbing his quill and letting the flow of words take him apart before making him whole again.

Josh settles to read the map in a faint candlelight, listening to the sound of quill scraping against the paper. They’ve come so far. By tomorrow night, they should be able to reach Windhelm’s bleak city gates, in case they don’t run into too many obstacles on their way.

The closer they get the worried Josh grows. He wonders whether they’ll be granted an access to the city. It’s not a secret that the guards are mistrustful of travelers and far from the friendliest. It’s where the northern rebels reign their nest, and the center of the Nord revolution gets its commands against the Empire. They need more time. Sneaking into the city will be nearly impossible due to Tyler’s injured state and the enormous walls that surround the city, and the only way through them is the gateway, steeply guarded. 

The entry will be the biggest problem. Josh rubs his chin, thinking about a fallback in case the main entrance denies their access.

Then he scowls at himself. What was he doing? Zack was not in Windhelm anymore. Kicking himself mentally, Josh blows out and rubs his eyes, shifting his concentration to the opposite way. Gods. He’s been so determined to lead their way to Windhelm that a change in plans is throwing him off now. He really needs to get some sleep.

The awaken silence interrupts Josh’s thoughts. It is then when he becomes aware of a steady streak of deep breaths, the sound of the quill having ceased.

Josh glances to his right. His eyes meet with a sleeping Tyler. Tyler, who has finally fallen asleep after the shocking events at the pass, is lying on his back with the quill still in his hand, lightly resting it against his belly.

With his head lolled to the side and his mouth hanging slightly open, Tyler is as gone as he looks. His chest falls as deeply as it raises, nailing him deeper into the dreamworld and wherever it has taken him tonight.

Josh takes in his peaceful face as he sleeps. There are no creases, not even a single wrinkle between Tyler’s brows as he slumbers. 

That proves it, Josh decides. They did it. 

The spirit doesn’t haunt him anymore.

Tyler is in a good place. The sight makes Josh sigh contently, heart swelling. Somehow it wears down all his worries, but ignites a fierce will to get Tyler safely to their destination, to take him to Zack with no more hurting. The feeling flames strongly in his blood, making Josh realize how much he wants to keep him safe. Tyler’s had enough hard days, Josh decides. He wants to see Tyler smiling again, wants him to feel better—

Josh is not given much time to do his observations and make out what they mean as Tyler’s journal suddenly starts slipping from his fingers. Josh jumps up as quietly as he can, ditching the map and hurrying to save the pages from getting glued together, but is a second too late. The covers slap closed and the tome drops down next to the unaware Tyler. Josh grabs it and opens it, cringing, hoping that the ink didn’t smudge too much. 

But it did. The fresh ink is most messy, haphazard letters now splayed and spoiled. It’s not like Tyler’s handwriting is the most tidiest anyway, but now it’s a sheer catastrophe. Mirrored from the left, the right page is claimed by words that don’t even resemble a common language in Josh’s eyes as he examines the text.

Sticking his finger to the top corner of the page and tapping, Josh hesitates. He knows he shouldn’t. He shouldn’t, but his curiosity is a monster, a beast that Josh can never tame. Standing stock still, Josh toys with the red bookmark that hangs from the spread. Taking one last glance at Tyler and the quill that rests limply in his hand, Josh sits down on his own bed.

With the diary in his hands, Josh turns back time with a single flick of his wrist. Rain’s Hand, Second Seed, Josh goes too far in months. He flips through the pages, he comes to Hearthfire, and all too soon comes Frostfall, and the beginning of Tyler’s journey.

Josh looks up at Tyler again who doesn’t move nor does he make a sound. Josh continues. He feels bad and tries not to pry too much, but fails miserably.

All the entries have been dated and signed. Tyler is a neat writer, using the diary to keep up with the passing days. Some days have more writing in them, some have less. If anything, Tyler’s made sure to come say hi and that he’s _‘still alive, to everyone’s surprise.’_

Josh chuckles quietly. Turning a page after another, Josh learns about Tyler’s days, traveling through the boreal plains and sparse tundra of the Whiterun Hold. One night he’d slept in an abandoned house, half collapsed from the other end but secure enough to give a good night’s sleep, as Tyler had described. Josh blinks as his eyes start to dry in the dim candle light. Reading further, Josh can easily imagine Tyler lying in an unfamiliar bed by himself, observing the nighttime sky through the holes in the roof and watching _Secunda_ pass through the bright constellations as the sight lulled him to sleep.

What can he say? Josh likes stargazing.

Another page, another day, Josh gets to read about Tyler’s visit in Whiterun. Apparently he had fed a dog, and gotten lured to play tag with the local kids. Obviously Tyler had agreed, only to get scolded by a bored guard when one of the kids would knock over a basket of fruit and fill the marketplace with a tidal wave of apples, flowing down the steps from the Wind District.

They had turned a deaf ear to him but gathered the fruits anyway. 

But then the guard had told him to keep his younger siblings in discipline, and Tyler’s stomach had wrenched. Boiling with guilt, Tyler’s heart burnt in sadness as it did in anger. He’d wasted too much time like a curious brat in a big city, and left the city gates in haste with a guilt deep enough to keep his feet on the move till the exhaustion would hit him.

He’d find himself in The Pale. And it got cold. Tyler talks about the choking feeling of it, shoving his way through the flooding snow day after day after day until his legs could barely hold him up, trying to find shelter and food as his stock had run dry. The quill is barely staying in his cold-trembling hand as he writes this, Tyler explains in his diary. He talks about a fire tending itself to its waning end and how he loses the feeling of it as he must’ve stopped to take a rest in a deserted wolf cave, praying for the strength to keep his eyes open and stay awake so that he wouldn’t freeze to death.

He’s lost his map and his way with no roads left as they’ve been buried in a snowstorm a day before. But he had to keep moving or he’d never get up again. Later from that, Tyler would discover his first dead body. Killed by thievery like the other one, it wouldn’t stay as his only horrid finding. Tyler talks about Zack, and the freezing fear that got through his hammering heart every time he would find a man murdered on the spot like a butcher’s cattle. 

Red, black and white, the writing is in turmoil. It’s about fear and losing hope, it makes Josh’s mouth go dry. The sun starts setting, and soon, Josh sees mentions of an archer by another dead man’s body. His own name starts appearing on the pages a lot after that. Josh smiles weakly despite the heavy story before it, he can’t help it. He comes to the words Tyler wrote the day Josh had taken him to the camp with Tyler having passed out after their reunion at the Windpeak Inn. Some of the sentences and even words are choppy, written the morning Josh had woken up lying beside the peasant who was barely able to keep his eyes open, much less to write coherently as it seemed to him.

The earliest pages dedicated to their first days together are smudged with messy droplets of ink and the slight grease of their shared meal at the border of Dawnstar. The pages are pulled into waves around the spots where the moisture has gone through. Josh gulps, the smudges and their stories having a load of unspoken words in his memories alone.

Josh flips the pages. It seems that a lot of Tyler’s headspace is spinning around him after that. Words filled with gratitude, Josh finds out about Tyler’s silent tears on a lonely night at the abandoned lighthouse, shed by the sheer relief that he’s not alone anymore. Tyler talks about Josh, about his good will to sleep beside him just to keep him _warm_ in this otherwise cruel world of Skyrim that he’s gotten to know more day by day. Josh never realized the severity of Tyler’s pain of being sent out and getting swallowed by solitude, scared that no one would come for him after he went missing- or died.

The words pain his heart, but Josh goes on. Tyler makes a soft sigh then, warm and comfy now as he lies on the bed sleep-claimed. The sound sends an intense wave of relief through Josh’s body— giving him the feeling that this is right. This is how it should be. Despite the defeated words written in The Pale and the desperation doing its talking through the diary, Tyler has made it this far. He never said a thing about surrendering, or going back home crying with a tail between his legs. Not without Zack.

By now, Josh can tell that Tyler is a fighter. But even still, Josh remembers. He remembers the look Tyler’s eyes had given him the second Josh had aimed an arrow at his head, ready to kill him if he wanted to. The thought of towering over the helpless peasant and radiating the obvious power over his life and death makes him feel sick to his stomach now. But Josh had seen Tyler’s eyes, and how they had looked at him, as if deciding he’d face his end for good now— throwing all his efforts away. Only then, Tyler had truly given up. He had closed his eyes in exhaustion for a short while, putting his head down and preparing to take the arrow through his skull before deciding  _no,_ and getting up again.

The moment had had an immediate impact on Josh. He didn’t recognize it then, but he couldn’t stop thinking about it either when he had left Tyler behind, repenting his actions immediately and thinking back to the days he had cried for his own brother.

Truth to be told, Josh had gone back to look for him the very same night despite the freezing cold weather, but never found him. 

Was it the divines’ guidance that their roads crossed in the city of Dawnstar only days later, Josh doesn’t know. But he was relieved upon seeing the peasant again, despite hiding his joy behind ugly mocking. 

Tyler had been drunk, and Josh couldn’t blame him for it.

Josh flips a page with more words on it. It’s been a rough journey, and to Josh, it’s stepped through in a few minutes of reading. It feels wrong, knowing that Tyler’s been through every second of it. 

But it’s not only that, Josh admits as he goes on. He takes in Tyler’s thoughts about him and them, _together_. And it’s nice. It’s nice to be someone’s last thoughts before they fall asleep every night, it’s stirring these old, buried feelings inside of him, it almost feels like—

Josh eyes widen as the words go by and he realizes what Tyler is truly saying. Warm words softly written, Josh doesn’t understand where the sudden love is coming from. There are fresh poems even, written about Joshas it says at the end and Tyler wonders if he will ever see them. _I’m gathering my courage for it,_ says one of his deeper thoughts in it, and Josh loses his own courage to even blink anymore. Josh stops hearing and seeing around himself as he stares at the words that the black ink has claimed as its own, meant to last till a fire would swallow them whole. 

Josh reads the poems over and over again to make sure he’s getting these things right. And then again. He does it until he feels dumb and can’t do it anymore.

His cheeks start burning, it’s suddenly even warmer in this room. _Tyler,_ Josh mouths the name, nearly saying it out loud. 

_Tyler!_

Something screams at him about the respecting Tyler’s privacy, so loud that it’s enough for Josh to believe it. So he closes the diary, and forces himself to take a shaken up breath, so hastily that he doesn’t even realize to worry about the wet ink anymore.

He sets Tyler’s dearest possession next to him, rubbing his eyes with his left hand as the other presses the tome against the bed, covering it. Why, just why did he had to find out this way _,_ Josh pummels himself. 

He leans on his knee with his shoulders sinking. By the Nine, what is he to do now?

Tyler has feelings for him.


	8. Troubled Mountains

* * *

“Tyler, slow down,” Josh pants as he tries to keep up with the other. Josh has to squint his eyes, the crystal white snow radiates the bright sunlight right into his face. Taking a hold of a slick pine, Josh leans on his leg and shakes his head in irritation, stopping altogether. “Tyler!” he shouts after him, the peasant climbing the steep ascent well ahead of him.

They slept in, but the day was still young with the piercing sun looking for its highest place in the sky. It was Tyler who had woken up first, shaking Josh awake with a new-found energy. He paid no mind to his diary that was suddenly set aside on the nightstand come morning. With the quill and the sealed bottle of ink resting next to it, Josh had found the courtesy of saving the black essence from being led to a dry death with how little there was any left of it.

The peasant was oblivious. Josh on the other hand, he couldn’t let the diary slip off his mind like it had slipped out of Tyler’s hands the night before. He’d lie awake, words swirling in his mind in a way more chaotic storm than the slow breaths of the peasant deeply asleep in the bed next to his. 

The words have weight in his feet even today, sinking deep in the snow as he’s the one to step in Tyler’s footprints now. Only now, Josh refused to take another step. He’s pulled into a halt, shouting out after Tyler and pleading him to listen.

It’s like Tyler hears him only then. He turns to look, a small amount of sweat glistening on his face as well. “Josh, we need to _move,”_ Tyler groans, frustration coating his tone now. They need to cross the mountain today if they don’t want to lose Zack’s trace and - gods, they do not. Josh knows this, yet here he is, standing unmoving, keeping Tyler at halt with his stubbornity. 

“It’s no use to push forward this frantically. We’ll run out of energy before noon if we’ll keep doing this,” Josh says and slaps his sapped leg to prove his point. “If we run into an ambush, we’ll have a real problem to deal with.” 

Tyler looks at him, catching his breath noisily. “I don’t think anyone would stay out here when there’s no mind moving around the mountains anyway. It’s just us.”

“Whatever.” Josh huffs, turning his head away to gaze at the treetops far below them. Tyler takes a better look at him then, grabbing a crooked root that pushes its way through the soil, keeping himself balanced as well.

“What is it?” he asks softer then, clutching the handle of his sword with the other. “You’ve been acting weird all morning. Did something happen?”

Josh doesn’t answer. The mountain wind howls in its highness all around them, but it’s not enough to kill the screaming silence between them.

Josh’s mouth opens, only to fall shut again. He doesn’t meet Tyler’s eyes. He just can’t. Josh shakes his head, and says, “We’re moving too fast,” and starts climbing towards Tyler who looks at him wordlessly but doesn’t budge, and helps to pull Josh up.

They make it to a sweet landing on the mountain’s side. They inhale and exhale, sinking their feet into the snow that keeps licking at their shins. Tyler leans on his thighs, rubbing at them, finally letting the exertion of the hiking show. The last night’s efforts at the grave still show their toll on him. Putting everything else aside, Josh has to make sure Tyler will be okay.

“Okay?” Josh asks him, knowing full well that Tyler’s ribs are still very much broken and the healing process too slow to keep up with their pace.

Regardless, Tyler says _yes_ , sounding so sure about himself that Josh believes him. The adrenaline pumps visibly through his veins and mends the strain with an admirable ease. It amazes Josh, how their goal yet unseen makes Tyler work harder than ever. The peasant is desperately thirsty for reaching the moment to reunite with his brother again. And, probably, give that punch he’s been forced to wait delivering way too long for his liking.

It brings the faintest of smiles to the peasant’s lips. The biting breeze colors his lips with the ones of frozen blood petals. Josh steps beside Tyler as the other straightens his back again, giving a pat on his shoulder to encourage him. Tyler follows him with his eyes curiously, hair sticking on his forehead, and Josh looks away, swallowing.

They find a path. It snakes its way higher up the lonely mountain, a thick growth of young pines giving them coverage. Tyler looks around them, Josh’s warning having a clear effect on him. There were many things that Tyler had to learn, traveling through the wilderness of Skyrim, but there are more things that he knows now than what he did when he set on his journey. All too sudden, his shoulders looked broader in Josh’s eyes. Josh realizes it only now despite having spent a lot of time behind him recently. 

There’s an odd sense of pride swelling in his chest. He doesn’t know how to describe it, and just like that, Josh is falling behind again, his thoughts running way ahead, all around Tyler.

They’ve known each other for such a short while, yet so much has happened. There’s no way for Josh to try and explain the pulsating ember that is starting to get air into the core of his heart again. It glows with a growing warmth, spreading all over his body ever since he stole a glance at Tyler’s diary and the hidden love letters in it, written at the most pained times of Tyler’s life.

But it scares him. Josh is so deep in thought, he can only vaguely recognize Tyler turning around to look at him again. The peasant shakes his head impatiently as Josh slowly swarms his way forth, not even bothering to step from one footprint to the next but rather pushing through them, leaving behind a clear pathway instead.

Tyler doesn’t nag though, and something else on the side of their trail catches Josh’s attention, forcing him to stop altogether.

“Oh shit, look what’s here,” Josh says and crouches down to his finding, getting a better inspect of it. Tyler spins around again surprised, quirking his eyebrow before going to Josh, shoveling snow out of his way. He makes his way, looking at Josh before casting his eyes down on their feet, saying nothing.

They stare at the pile of bear shit with serious, stone-cold faces.

“It’s not him,” Tyler suddenly says, and his gravely tone and the words Josh did not expect to hear make him lose his composure. 

Josh bursts into a loud laughter. Tyler smirks as Josh has to get up and turn away to catch his breath, going on with his nonsense.

“I could be wrong,” Tyler jokes. “He’s always been so full of shit but I never thought that he’d turn into a literal pile of it.”

“You’re just talking,” Josh says and shoves him, wiping at the corner of his eye chuckling as they start walking again. “He was very nice to me.”

Tyler gasps dramatically. “Are you saying that he’s better than me?” He insists, seemingly hurt as he brings his hand to the place where Josh’s was only moments before, rubbing warmth into it. “You’ve met him only once!”

“He was friendly-“

“Josh,” comes the warning.

“Considerate-“

“You’re just trying to make me jealous.”

Josh cringes, suddenly remembering the whole situation between them, but keeps going anyway, “Handsome...”

Tyler snorts. “Fuck you Josh. Go hang out with that piece of shit over there if you’re so much in love.”

Josh laughs. It sets his heart to ease, melting the uninvited wall of ice between them. However it makes a clenching jump when a gruesome sound reaches their ears and forces them to stop, yanking their attention uphill. 

At first, they see nothing, silence breathing around them. Then, a bank of snow makes its move, and they realize that it’s not snow that they’re staring at at all.

It’s a bear. A stern, rugged grey fur merges with the snow and makes the beast become one with its surroundings. It’s so obscure that there was no chance of spotting it before coming to a close quarter with it. Josh frowns. They have already stepped on the space that the beast has claimed as its own. Considering the guttural noises, they were passing through a forbidden territory, and the Snow Bear didn’t seem pleased at all.

They still have a safe amount of distance between them. The bear stands higher uphill from them. It hides amongst the scrawny trees, following their every movement with an unreadable wariness to its behavior. 

The bear gets up on its hind legs, craning its neck and spreading its paws. The corners of its mouth are smudged with an old blood, a sign of a meal well gone and ripped. A long set of claws stretch themselves out from the strong paws, dark like lead and sharp like sickles that cut the air. There’s no doubt that they’ve ran into a fearsome creature, forcing the air around them to thicken.

The animal keeps staring at them with a gruesome pressure, not moving an inch. A thick hump of silvery grey fur masses on its shoulders. The hair stands up, doubling the beast’s breadth as the animal falls silent to judge the two intruders for violating its fortress.

Tyler swallows, shrinking at its towering size. “What is it doing?” he asks, a thick coat of worry paling his voice.

“It’s probably just sniffing the air, bears are curious creatures,” Josh explains calmer, having encountered and hunted down these animals countless of times before. He wades his way through the snow to take a hold of Tyler’s arm, slightly tugging his stiff body. “Just let it be, and back down slowly. Come on,” he continues with a lowered voice.

The bear roars, its voice echoing in the mountains with a terrifying power.

“H-holy shit.”

“Tyler, just follow me, don’t just stand there,” Josh hisses, and pulls Tyler harder, making him stumble and nearly fall over. 

“Josh—” 

It might be the sudden movement, or just the nature’s inexhaustible cruelty, but the bear roars again, and it snorts, outing wet, hot air that evaporates in the cold. Tiny splatters of bloody saliva drips on the snow. 

It sinks back down on all fours, snorting again before shaking its head and- 

Charging at them.

Tyler’s eyes widen. 

“It’s attacking!” Tyler shouts, and Josh spins around in haste, taking the circumstances in. 

Tyler fights himself free from his grip then, getting rid of their backpack and throwing it aside. It lands on the ground with a muffled thud while the bear’s giant paws stomp against the hillside like a set of war drums, leaving sinister clouds of swirling snow behind its trail.

Josh comes to stand by Tyler’s side. “This is bad,” he says, taking his bow and nocking an arrow. “This is really, really bad.”

“Run!”

They spread, going separate ways and taking their stances as there was nowhere to escape. Josh moves up the hill, circling to the right and throwing a glance over his shoulder to make sure that Tyler can get away in his injured state. Knowing that running is no solution against a bear, Josh slows down. His eyes wander, finally catching Tyler’s form flash between the thickened terrain of trees, heading to the opposite direction.

Josh lets it happen, hoping that him staying behind will baffle the bear. Suddenly, his foot gets stuck on something and he staggers, hitting his knee on a sharp stone under the snow. Getting quickly up, Josh feels his skin bleeding and the icy wind pushing its way through the fresh hole on his pant leg. Josh curses, his movements grow slow and clumsy due to the piled up snow without him putting any effort into it, stumbling on the soil that is thick with pine trees, thick with rocks and fallen off tree branches, broken under the mass of snow.

He ladles his way forth. He’s quickly out of breath, having marched through the mountains in a way too high tact and having not enough time to get rest. His concerns have become true. However there was no time for bemoaning. The bear was coming quickly closer, threading through the obstacles that Josh had to waste his energy on. With Tyler out of the animal’s sight, the bear has clearly picked its victim in Josh. That’s good.

Josh keeps running with his bow in his hand, arrow in the other, ready to draw and aim at the beast’s skull. He finds a shelter behind a round stone that is big enough to give him a coverage, but allows him to use his weapon as well. Snow flies in the air when he brakes on it, quickly crouching down and pulling the strong bowstring back. And Josh aims, closing his other eye and straightening his finger. His muscles tremble in overstrain, making it hard to concentrate on seeking a good shot. An angry bear can look twice as big as its real size, Josh knows this, yet he struggles to get a perfect aim with all the trees standing on his way. 

“Fuck…” Josh curses, and tries to fight the sweat trickling to his eyes, blinking, blinking- 

Further away from the two, Tyler stops running. He can surely see that Josh has gotten caught. However having no time to worry about the peasant and feeling more relieved that he managed to escape, Josh draws in a breathless intake of air, and the first of his arrows rushes free. 

It hits the bear on its front. The wind has harassed the arrow, forcing the pointy end to sink on an unfortunate spot and skim right back as it hits the hardened flesh and working muscles beneath it, delivering no real damage. 

Josh doesn’t give up. Another shot, this arrow gets a perfect hit in the center of the beast’s front. The thick fat tissue protects it from a great harm, Josh sees this, but the arrow keeps its stand. The scarce scent of blood drives the animal even crazier. Josh has no time to nock the next blow before it’s too late. The bear reaches him, stopping right in front of him. A giant maw stretches wide open with dozens of tarnish teeth at the sight of its prey; sharp canines burst out of the black gums, thicker than Josh’s fingers and surely more deadly than the armed man in front of it. The bear roars. The dried up blood starts flowing with the running spit again, Josh wrenches his nose, the reek of death wrapping its arms around him.

The frenzied roar deafens his ears. A slash comes from his right, Josh has barely enough time to react— the horrid claws nearly hit his shin as he stumbles, scraping the fur on his boot. Falling on his side, Josh spins on the side to get avoid from getting crushed, the vile beast chasing after his every movement, attempting to stomp on him. Getting quickly up, Josh puts his bow away, drawing his dagger instead. 

He’s taking a huge risk. 

The next blow comes. Josh leaps quickly to avoid it, jumping on top of the stone and backflipping off of it in a quick motion. His quick wits set the bear in a momentary confusion, giving Josh a chance for a counter attack. Allowing the bear no time to figure out what’s happening, Josh slices a long trail along the rugged fur on its leg, hoping to bust a tendon. 

Silvery fur takes a clear turn into the color of crimson. The bliss is short-handed, giving Josh no time to savor his small victory; the beast pushes against the ground and changes its direction rapidly to revenge. The huge mass with a terrifying agility reacts way too quickly. The blow Josh has no chance to see comes from the left, a deep wound carves itself on his bicep— Josh lets out a pained yell to press on the cut as his flesh splits in two separate ways, gushing with fresh blood.

The bear attacks again. Its four big paws help the animal shift its weight on the unsteady terrain, moving easily around in the familiar territory. Its thick neck stretches out, strong jaws crack against each other, but find no Josh in their teeth. He steps aside, quickly stabbing on of the bear’s paw to slam it aside. His eyes want to screw shut in pain. His wound bleeds painfully. Feeling his warm blood flow and embrace his arm, Josh is more than ready to give back; his movements are instinctive as he seizes the momentum and thrusts his dagger on the bear’s rear with a scream, hard. The bear growls in fury, finding the cause of its pain.

His dagger seems no better than a bite of a flea against the beast’s huge size, but it’s stuck in the animal’s flesh now. Keeping his firm grip around the hilt and trying to yank it off, the bear’s struggling forces Josh to follow, getting painfully yanked from his bleeding arm. Their mixed blood paints the fresh snow in crimson. The beast turns swiftly around, the long sickles trying to a reach and reap Josh to death. The sudden change in direction and Josh’s stretches out arm takes the yank entirely on his shoulder. Josh slams against the rugged mass of fur, feeling the strain as clearly as the damned beast can feel the weapon in its flesh. Even still, he doesn’t let go of the weapon. The bear keeps spinning around, growling and growling, trying to reach Josh with its paw as the knife twists in its wound, sternly stuck and only adding to the bear’s pain.

The bear doesn’t stop moving despite Josh hanging on the weapon for his dear life. It keeps chasing after the cause of its pain. Suddenly, it takes a turn to the opposite direction _again_ , getting Josh off guard and turning the tables as well; the trees in his eyes flash in a blur, Josh’s grip on the dagger’s handle slips. It sends him flying in the air, right against a big hardened tree trunk with a painful shout ripping out of him, knocking out the air.

It knocks him against the ground as well. To his horrid, Josh’s eyes land on Tyler’s dark form standing behind them. And the peasant, he’s seen it all, having come back to help Josh. Josh can see him screaming his name, but the ringing in his ears won’t let him hear his voice, barely echoing in his dizzy mind. 

The snow swallows his aching body as if to pull him deeper in. He can’t move. His pained breathing heaves against the crook of his bleeding arm and strained shoulder, struggling as he fights to regain his movability. The bear grows lowly, piercing Josh with its gaze. It comes closer, stomping ever so slowly.

Josh heaves for his lost breath. His blurred vision raises from the snow. Not caring about the bear, Josh looks past it, seeing only Tyler.

 _No,_ he can read the peasant’s lips say behind the last few trees between them, and he sees the sudden terror take over Tyler’s body. _No,_ Josh wants to say painedly himself, seeing Tyler drawing his sword and yanking the bloodied blade back to freedom.

Tyler flinches at the sight of it. Burdened by his heavy crime after the battle at the border of The Winterhold, the peasant had forgotten to cleanse the weapon. With his mind lying elsewhere, the peasant was reluctant to even look at the blood-smudged sword lying at the foot of his bed, marked by the young life-lost bandit of The Wayward Pass.

Now moving the blade to slice his view between the struggling Josh and the Snow Bear approaching him, an avalanche of ripping pain visibly bursts in Tyler’s chest. It spreads like a wildfire, taking him back to The Pass and beyond. Pictures flash in his mind, caused not by his crushed bones, but something stronger.

 _The fear for someone’s life_ , Josh recognizes. It flames itself alight in Tyler’s eyes, frantically screeching and clawing in his brain. Josh can feel its pressure hitting him. Fear is the strongest of emotions, and it takes its reigns over the peasant in an instant. It spreads further in his body, quickly taking over his swordhand all the way to the tips of his fingers and his feet, making the peasant move without a fight.

Like that day in the crevasse.

Tyler is already moving before Josh can tell him to stop.

“Hey! _Beast!”_

Switching his sword to his left hand, Tyler runs as fast as his feet can carry him. Grabbing the handle of their backpack that lies in the white, Tyler yanks it up and spins swiftly, releasing the thing with a snarl and watching it soars in the air. The bag hits a scrubby pine near the two, bending the tree with the force that the bag hits it with. Dry snow bursts in the air, catapulting back to Tyler before slowing down and spreading on the ground, glimmering in the sunlight.

The bear is right above Josh now. However the flashes of light catch the bear’s attention, forgetting the easy target on the ground. It looks at its next opponent angrily, getting back up on his hind legs with the dagger still jugging out of its flesh. 

Blood runs through Josh’s fingers when he presses his palm against the bleeding cut on his arm, getting up on his knees. _Damn,_ Josh curses and looks for a support against a bank of snow. The hard impact on the tree trunk holds him in its vertigo.

He failed to rip the weapon out.

Josh’s spine is quivering from the impact. Josh feels dizzy, getting up on his knees weakly. Not knowing if he should hold the bleeding cut and help Tyler or start bandaging it, things get even harder as the bear gets back on all fours and trots towards the peasant now. Tyler grabs the hilt of his weapon with both of his hands at the sight of it, snarling.

More curses, Josh’s voice finally carries further than his body can move.

“Tyler,” he croaks and coughs, and he shouts. “Don’t try to fight it in a close combat, you’re going to get yourself killed!” Josh roars the last part and watches in horror as Tyler ignores every single of his words, taking a wider stance with the bear coming closer, bracing himself to face the beast on his own.

“Where the fuck would I _go?”_ Tyler shouts back, and Josh is helpless at his words, dashing back to his bow again.

At that moment, Tyler _roars._ His voice is so mighty that the bear and Josh both halt in surprise, not expecting that such scream could release itself from Tyler’s lungs. 

The bear stops as if hitting a stone wall; the snow flies through the air, some of it hitting Tyler who doesn’t even flinch, holding the sword between them; the two are facing each other only a few feet away from each other now, defending their own terrain. The bear stares at Tyler with its night-black eyes, seemingly intimidated, observing its opponent whose shoulders heave in a heavy movement; Tyler clutches his sword in both hands, furiously praying that the animal would back down, to go back, back to the mountains.

“Go back,” Tyler repeats lowly. “Just go back to the mountains...” he says, sweat gathering at his forehead, refusing to let his fear show.

The bear hesitates, snorting again with a growl. It shows its teeth again. Raising to its hind legs for one more time, the bear answers to Tyler’s voice with its own. It’s a terrifying sound to hear up close, and Tyler is forced to take a step back, biting his lip at the same time the bear lunges at him.

Tyler tries to avoid the attack, but slips on the loose snow at the same time. The giant animal is about to reach him with a single leap. Having put too much momentum into the attack, the snow drifts the bear right over him. Tyler whizzes back to Josh’s sight right between the beast’s legs, luckily avoiding its strong jaws biting him to death. 

Arms curled protectively around his head, Tyler untangles in a daze, having no comprehension of what just happened. He rolls his head to shake off the snow. He’s dropped his sword, Tyler runs his hand in the white nearly panicked, before the bear slowly stomps around, growling and facing its spoil over again, growing clearly frustrated of the two.

The sword lies behind the beast’s back. Releasing a shaky cloud of breath at the sight of it. Tyler lies on his back and ladles the snow with his arm, trying to scramble back up before getting in the way.

Making noise, the animal inches closer as if enjoying the sight of the unarmed man before it with nothing but its animalistic instincts thirsting for a bloodshed. 

Josh doesn’t allow it. Having finally a clear pathway with no trees blocking his way, his arrow hisses venomously before piercing the hardened flesh of its target on its side, eating its way inside.

The bears pupils contract in rage, bellowing at Josh with an ill will. 

“Yeah,” Josh snarls, drawing the next arrow despite his throbbing arm. “Look right here you little fucker,” he continues under his breath, hoping to hide his shakiness. He’s just about to unleash the next one when suddenly, Tyler springs forward, running right towards the giant. The peasant doesn’t hesitate to risk his chance when the bear is still distracted, grabbing the hilt of Josh’s dagger and ripping it out with one firm tug, causing a vile bleeding. It works, and the blood comes out like a red rush from a geyser, marking Tyler with it. 

The bear’s massive head throws itself back to Tyler, the sudden pain driving its eyes into madness. Tyler trips in the snow, trying desperately to pick up his weapon. The bear pushes off its hind legs and prepares to drive its claws into the peasant’s side, and all Josh can do is scream for his name, and pray that Tyler notices in time.

Tyler’s body catches on the scream and reacts on instinct. His brain spots the sudden shadow flashing in his peripheral vision. Rolling quickly out of the way, Tyler swings his sword, slashing the blade on the same spot Josh’s dagger had spilled the bear’s blood for the first time, unknowingly deepening the wound. The bear’s fur grows even redder, and Josh aims again, wanting his next arrow right through the animal’s skull.

The bear seems to know what he’s thinking. There’s a slash, one after another, with the bear pushing Tyler to step back and driving the peasant to stand between the bear and Josh, using him as a shield against Josh’s bow.

 _Clever bastard,_ Josh curses lowly. He has to find a better position to get a better shot. From this spot he’s useless, afraid of hitting Tyler if he does. With the wind doing unpredictable spins in the air, the snow keeps swirling in the air to the fighters’ rapid steps, tinting to red as the blood dribbles to the ground. 

Josh starts for a run to get back to action, but is forced to stop, suddenly seeing where their fight was going. The bear keeps steering Tyler to the wanted location, clearly starting to get tired from their fight. And Tyler, he doesn’t see, too occupied with avoiding the blows in front of him to see what’s behind his back.

They’re getting dangerously close to the cliff’s edge, with nothing there to save them from a dangerous fall.

“Tyler, watch out!” Josh screams to warn him. The call makes Tyler lose his concentration for a mere second and look behind him, his movements stopping at the sight of the edge.

Tyler’s heel stops at a root beneath the snow. The peasant loses his balance gasping, swaying back and flailing his sword to find his footing back.

It leaves his front unguarded. The bear growls with spit flowing down its chin as it raises its paws for one last time. Slashing quickly and blindly, everythingin Josh’s eyes slow down when the bear knocks the sword out of Tyler’s hands heavily, leaving him wide open with nothing to protect himself with. 

It all happens in an instant. Tyler’s eyes have barely time to flash in fear before the sound of flesh ripping off fills Josh’s ears, widened eyes forced to watch the lone string of blood coming after the grey beast’s claws.

Tyler’s horrid scream fills the mountain range. Josh is not sure if it’s the echo or if his brain keeps torturing him by repeating it over and over again, having no mercy on him. It rings long after the peasant’s stunned body has fallen down the precipice by the force of the bear’s strike. 

He’s gone.

 

*

 

  
Like a miracle, Tyler survives from the fall. Having hit an army of spruces one after another, the wind had rushed out of him, howling dreadfully in his ears. But the forest cover had slowed the deadly fall just enough. He’s stuck in the snow now, the bouncing boughs of the thick spruces his body had struck against drop snow on top of him, burying him deeper beneath it.

Stripped from every clear thought of what just happened, Tyler coughs. He chokes on the snow, wheezing for air as he barely manages to pull himself out of the bank he’s fallen into.

For a moment, he’s totally out of it. Then, the feeling of bloody snow melting on his face brings him back, the thickness of it dripping down his writhing face. Tyler huffs, throwing his head up.

The sight makes him want to scream and he does, seeing and _feeling_ the five deep incisions on his chest, pulsating and spitting blood and gore in the same rhythm as the mayhem of his heart. Still stunned from the fall, Tyler turns onto his side, sinking his fingers deep into his own flesh. His clothes hang wet from his chest, ripped to shreds, and the white beneath him takes a turn into a bloody river as he slips, his shaking arm unable to hold him up. Tyler wants to scream in agony, but the slicing pain doesn’t let him breathe. The air feels suddenly freezing, paralyzing his lungs. 

Whimpering like a hurt animal and feeling exactly like it, Tyler slips again as he tries to fix his position. He ends up sliding a few feet down as the steep hillside shoves him down. On his back again, lying upside down, the position makes him nauseous as the blood that is not spurting out of him rushes to his head.

Tyler chokes uselessly. His broken ribs are newly aflame from the fall, he can’t breathe. The red puddle around him grows, the snow eats it up like a long-awaited feast, and Tyler’s vision splits in two and starts to fade, sharp trees blurring in a suffused crown above him. 

The last thing Tyler hears is someone screaming. For what or whom, Tyler doesn’t know, but his head turns like a magnet at the sound of it. His body shakes and bleeds. Two shadows rush towards him, their distant shapes are only vague fog in his eyes, blurring more from every bat of an eye he takes.

Soon, he can’t do even that. All the strength in his muscles pours out with his blood. The ringing in his ears grows, sapping his hearing and leaving him alone with the expendable rapids of his heart beating up his senses.

“Josh,” Tyler utters to the growing shadows around him, but it’s not Josh, there’s two of them, but Tyler can’t see. “Josh…”

He passes out at the same time someone presses their hands against his wounds, and doesn’t answer to them calling for him. 


	9. Violent Lullaby

They’re going to cauterize Tyler’s wounds.  

That’s what the two people tell Josh when the door to a lone house behind the trees slams open and they rush in. Josh doesn’t want to believe his ears, too caught up in carrying an acutely bleeding Tyler in his arms; the peasant’s breathing is quick and shallow, Josh can feel him trembling against himself. Tyler is pale and dying with handfuls of blood in his face and his hair, utterly powerless and all to Josh’s horror, still awake. 

“You can’t fucking do that,” Josh tells them. “He’s awake!”

“He’s going to bleed to death if we don’t. We don’t have time to stitch the wounds closed anymore,” come the firm words as the harsh answer. Josh gulps as he watches the tools getting cleansed and thrown into the fire, sucking up the heat greedily.

Josh is forced to sit down against the wall, holding Tyler’s wounded body up between his legs. Back to chest, Josh watches these people move in a purposeful manner as he presses the already soaked cloth against Tyler’s bleeding front to deter the blood from escaping his body.

They cut his clothes with a knife. Tyler lays motionless against Josh as they work quickly together to strip his torso from the remaining furs and leathers. A blank cotton shirt comes off lastly slick and blood-soaked, drenched as they yank it off, dry threads ripping and peeling.

Beneath it all, Tyler’s chest is still heaving, and Josh is frantically praying that he’d lose his consciousness for real. Tyler breathes painfully, five sharp incisions litter his front, slashed sideways and tilting downwards. The damned wild beast Josh had failed to kill himself has left its mark on him forever. They’re still pulsating to the beat of Tyler’s heart. Bleeding, blood smudges his neck and dribbles down his chest in long trails and stains his ripped clothes beneath him, pooling on his sides. 

Josh turns quickly away when he spots a hint of bone flashing amidst all the red and gore in front of him.

Tyler is _awake._

He’s not given much time to look somewhere else. Lifting his head, a small steel slab is raised from the burning embers, glowing with the slightest hint of red to it. Smoke fizzles around it. Even Josh’s body draws taut at the sight of it. He must curse himself, for the gesture pulls Tyler’s attention back to their surroundings, head lolling back to awareness and immediately looking for the source of threat in the room. 

Tyler is weak from the loss of blood, however his body and the noises he makes hide nothing as he sees the blurred image of the glowing tool in his eyes, the fire’s reflection flashing in his eyes as if to defy what was to come.

Tyler kicks feebly when the person steps towards them, frail and slipping at first but growing more frantic. Josh finds himself holding him harder, heart skipping a beat as he realizes that he has to keep him from struggling throughout the entire treatment.  

Josh can _smell_ the fear radiating off of Tyler’s body. In fact, he’s growing quite panicked.

The peasant’s attention is nailed to the tool. Wide-eyed and drenched in the cold sweat, he’s not given a chance to defend himself before they rip a piece out of his abandoned shirt and fold it, shoving it into his mouth to save his tongue from getting bitten in half. Tyler digs his teeth into it, breathing harshly through his nose now. 

“Bite into it, good,” _she_ tells him, swiftly taking a hold of the cooled down steel slab as Tyler gets distracted, eyes tightly sealed, bracing himself. 

She looks up at Josh then. His blood freezes on its tracks.

“What do I do?” he asks tightly, breathing shallow and nearly jolting away himself. The wall behind his back doesn’t let him.

They look each other right in the eye.

“Don’t let him move,” she only says before looking back down, all attention back to Tyler. 

They make him take the steel.

The power that Tyler’s body reacts to the first contact gets them all off guard; Tyler jerks violently, hard skull knocking against Josh as his back arches high over the floor, nearly fighting himself free from their grasp. He’s screaming and wailing, utterly fright-struck from the loss of escape, and Josh is biting down his own tears as his hold around Tyler tightens, wrapping his legs around his middle to keep him in place.

Again and again, the fire-taken slab taps against his bloodied chest, moving around and sealing the bleeding tissue with a sick sound coming from the peasant’s flesh. Tyler’s entire body is fighting the treatment. He kicks his feet, desperately trying to find his way out, but Josh doesn’t let him. _They_ won’t let him, the third person coming to their aid and keeping Tyler from kicking.

Josh holds him in his iron trap, screwing his eyes shut as Tyler screams and thrashes as loudly as the cloth in his mouth allows him, sharp teeth dug deep into the fabric. It’s the most pained sound Josh has ever heard, and his eyes threaten to water from the cruelty of it as he listens to it bleed from Tyler’s throat right next to his ear. The peasant’s hands flail in convulsions, hopelessly trying to grip on something to rip and scratch against it. He nearly hits his helper on her head, and Josh’s pain grows, pulling him away unyieldingly and letting Tyler take a hold of him and pierce through the flesh on his hands to leave bloodied crescents behind, screaming.

They replace the slab into a new one. It’s barely cooled down enough to keep from scorching the flesh and tissue too much. The two switch the tools together; Josh can feel a wave of its heat hit his face and is forced to watch it come in contact with Tyler’s body again.

Tyler faints. Suddenly quieting, the broken body slumps down and doesn’t rise to put up a fight anymore. Tight fingers clutching Josh’s now bloodied skin give up their hold on consciousness. Confused of his own reaction, Josh’s tears break free only then, dripping down his cheeks onto Tyler’s bloodied hair in thick trails. Pure relief mixed with guilt fills his body as he feels Tyler’s limbs stop moving. Gasping wetly, Josh pulls him up with his hooked arms and crosses his fingers with Tyler’s who doesn’t squeeze him back anymore. Instead, Josh squeezes him, slowly rocking him back and forth as if to lull him into a deep sleep.

The murky air is thick with the smell of burnt flesh and the fat in it, feeling sticky against Josh’s crawling skin. The stench does not recede, and Josh is nauseously trying to swallow the contents of his stomach back down to keep them from hurling right then and there.

He doesn’t understand how the person holding the slab is pulling through.

The blood stops flowing. Only the shaken up breath and her falling back is enough to tell Josh that it’s finally over. 

All the strength sapped from his limbs, Josh lets go of him, nearly pushing Tyler’s unconscious body entirely away from him. His other arm slams against the wall as his other flies over to his mouth, failing to keep his agonized crying from bursting past his sweaty palm. Staring shocked at the back of Tyler’s unmoving head, Josh can barely get back up and check his pulse. Holding his head in his shaking hands, Josh sees the thick veins bulging from Tyler’s hot skin, and only then does Josh truly see what they’ve done to him, a mass of bizarre burnt flesh pulsating in the center of dried up blood. 

Josh stares at it until he can’t, bolting up but not making it outside in time.

 

*

 

Tyler’s legs are hoisted up on the wooden bedpost and furs to strengthen his vital functions. Josh keeps guard beside him, leaning his back against the girder walls where dry moss poked out from the hinges. He can barely see Tyler’s chest rise and fall beneath all the furs and covers he’s wrapped in to ease the horrid coldness his body heat had turned to.

Josh faces the ceiling with a foul taste still on his tongue and grim colors swirling in his thoughts. He’s worried sick. Shocked and worried.

Tyler hasn’t shown a sign of waking up. His head is turned away, face furrowed to a deep frown despite being unconscious. 

The warm glow of the fireplace in the main hall doesn’t reach the small room Tyler is positioned in, or that’s how Josh feels; they’re surrounded by candles, the serene flames move the soft-edged shadows to the tune of their slow dance nearly ritually, as if to stop the time altogether. In their light, Tyler’s skin wasn’t merely pale, but entirely colorless in Josh’s eyes. The sight starts a shiver through his spine, the ghostly blue light seeping from the narrow windows escorting his current distress.

The sun has set many hours before, the long hours of waiting showing no mercy for them. Josh’s draws in a weighted breath, anxiously scrubbing the back of his head against the wall, feeling the splinters dig into his scalp. The dull sting keeps him awake for the time being.

Josh leans back forth restlessly, his muscles opposing the sudden shifting and starting a fleeting blackness take over his eyesight. Rubbing his aching temple, Josh sighs just as deeply. He hasn’t slept, and with the adrenaline wearing down, both his mind and body is starting to shut down. Feeling nearly dizzy, Josh rests his head on his crossed fists, fixing his attention back to the peasant. 

All things considered, they got lucky. Tyler’s tripping on those blasted roots had saved him from getting his throat slit open, a blow that would have immediately killed him had the staggering not sent him fall backwards into the empty air behind him.

The bear had barely missed the crucial arteries. Despite it all, Josh can’t help but let the guilt eat him alive. He had reacted too slow, had put too much time on getting a good shot, when all he had to do was to distract that bloody beast and get it away from Tyler with everything he got.

Once again, Tyler has saved his life. He’s done it thrice, in fact. And what did Josh do? Nothing.

Did he even thank him, he wonders somberly. Josh closes his eyes. He can’t remember. A dull ache pulsates against his skull as if pleading for a way to escape, and it makes his head suffer. If he doesn’t get to pay his debt back to Tyler, he’s going to repent all his life. He didn’t set on this journey only to bury Tyler’s body in the rocky embrace of his cursed homeland. 

Something unexplainable happens within him that moment. It makes him move and in a desperate way, start a tide inside his head to unfurl.

Josh doesn’t believe in the Divines, nor does he really know how to pray. He doesn’t know what to say, but he knows that Tyler does, the peasant having his way in the art of words. He’s seen Tyler praying before, has seen how effortlessly the act had came from him. It gives him courage. It’s enough to let his mind go dead and have a free will of its own.

So Josh prays. He prays for Arkay, the god of life and death.

He prays for Stendarr, the god of mercy.

He prays for Mara, the goddess of _love_.

Josh prays for all of them, he’s ready to go through all the Nine of the Divines if he has to, throwing himself on his knees and beg on the ground if they so want.

Josh waits silently, but gets no signs. Opening his curled fingers shaking against his temples and moving them to cover his mouth to stifle himself, Josh stares into nothingness, turning to look at the man that suddenly meant everything to him. Feeling the divine actions bring him no peace, Josh’s helpless thoughts race like a rabbit trying to escape an unfed hound.

Beneath the furs, beneath the bandages, Tyler’s flesh is a ruin, healthy skin burnt away. Josh can’t shake it away, painting the demons all over the walls; a twisted mass of five scars would show themselves in Tyler’s body forever, slick-black scars merged together at some places, skin dry and hard like a struck leather, the fissures framing the edges. Josh had seen it again as he came back, helping the two cleanse and bandage the wound. 

The horrid stench of it was still strong in the air. It’s possibly sealed itself in Josh’s memory forever.

As a hunter, Josh should be accustomed to it. Anyone should, but the fact that the fizzling sound came from Tyler, another goddamn human being, made it impossible for Josh to tolerate. The weight of their accident had showed itself in his hands, carrying Tyler to this damned bed himself.

Tyler hasn’t seen it yet. Josh wishes he never had to. 

Josh shakes his head, refusing to let the dark thoughts consume him. If he couldn’t care for Tyler then, he’s going to do it now. With the Divines' help or not.

Josh shifts on his stool, attempting to check the peasant’s pulse again, to see if it’s gotten any stronger. Then he realizes that Tyler is awake. He’s awake, and all prayers spring to the open air, and pulling Josh up with them.

“Ty—“ Josh is gasping, springing loudly up from his stool and circling to Tyler’s front. One hand slams against the wooden wall as the other squeezes the bed frame. “Tyler!” 

The peasant doesn’t say anything. But he’s awake, it wasn’t a hallucination of Josh’s crashing sanity after all— Tyler’s breathing grows labored, there’s pain in his eyes, pain in his body language as his muscles jerk with a dry gasp. A weak bump moves beneath the furs with Tyler’s hand shifting towards his bandaged chest as he tries to lift his head, powerless.

Josh leaves the room. 

“Help,” he calls, sounding foreign in his own ears. “Please,” he says. “Tyler is awake.”

The Breton woman has fallen asleep. Her long wavy hair pools around her head on the full table top she’s resting against, arms nestled as a pillow. However she’s quickly up and awake at Josh’s calling, and taking in his frantic words in with an admirable calmness.

She hurries to Josh’s side at once. Josh leaves room for her, the hassle pulling his attention from the cabin door opening. Too distracted to care, Josh goes back to Tyler’s sickbed, however giving the Breton the room she needs. He stays in the background.

She’s trying to reach Tyler with her voice. It’s dull from the late hours, but firm enough to get Tyler focused. 

The peasant is sweating, staring and squinting at her with the best he can as if seeing her for the first time. Maybe he is— Josh will never forget the faint look in Tyler’s eyes despite the panic-stricken behavior that the shock had caused in his body. She seems to push herself too close to Tyler’s space for his liking, but it works just right; the peasant pushes himself away, weak and whimpering, frantically searching something with his gaze, his head finally rising from the pillows.

Only the sight of Josh calms him down. It’s an invitation for him to step closer and Josh does. It’s all the peasant needs to start calling his name. It’s weak, it’s so weak that Josh feels another sting in his heart, and Tyler coughs up to the point Josh thinks he might get nauseous- it brings him pain but Tyler pulls through, repeating his name.

“Josh,” Tyler says, his voice so scratchy it’s barely a voice at all.

“Josh,” he says stronger, and before anything else, Tyler asks, “Are you okay?” 

“Tyler,” Josh manages after a bout of silence, unable to answer at first as his face twists in disbelief. Is that the first thing on Tyler’s mind after nearly getting killed? Josh can feel his heart crawling up into his throat.

Despite the choking feeling of it, Josh croaks out his answer. It all comes out thick and slow with a haggard edge of shaking to it.

“I’m the last thing you need to worry about. All you need to worry about right now is yourself.”

Tyler stares up to him, taking his words in slowly. He starts to get more and more agitated as the time goes by as if being unsatisfied with Josh’s answer. Before he has time to get any worse in his wounded state, Josh comes closer, grabbing his hand and giving Tyler a gulp of water in the form of his words. He calls out his name to get him focused at first. And he says,

“I’m okay, hey. We’ll both be. We’re alive.” 

Tyler’s eyes roll to the back of his head at Josh’s words. His back arches, and for a moment Josh fears him losing consciousness again. But Tyler comes back to him, blinking tightly and fixing his eyes on the ceiling as if to thank the gods for their mercy.

He’s not in the shape of getting scolded, but Josh can’t keep his own question trapped inside of him no longer as the tears start burning in his eyes yet again.

“Why did you do that Tyler?” Josh shakes his head slowly, letting one runaway slip down his cheek. “Why did you come back?”

Tyler manages a pained smile. It’s as awful as his wound. Sweat glistens on his damp skin as he briefly closes his eyes before attempting to talk.

His words gets barely out there.

“I couldn’t let it get you,” Tyler finally says. His voice breaks at the end. He sucks in a pained breath as he grows quite emotional. “I couldn’t let it happen again,” he rasps, and starts whimpering when Josh gives him no chance to say anything else before he’s leaning down, carefully wrapping his arms around the wounded. Afraid of breaking him somehow, Josh’s arms are pulled into a loose embrace around the peasant, who presses his damp head against Josh’s while fighting to free both of his arms from the covers to hug him as well.

Josh’s eyes are closed as he listens to the furs rustling and finally feeling Tyler take a hold of his arms and weakly gliding his cold fingers up his skin. Higher they go, before coming to halt against the bandage on Josh’s bare arm. Josh feels Tyler touching it again and again. He pulls away, looking Tyler into his eyes.

“It’s okay,” Josh says. “It’s okay.” 

Tyler believes him, however letting go of him reluctantly. The peasant gulps nearly disappointed as Josh pulls away completely to give him the space he needs. Tyler tries to squeeze his hands to keep his warmth close, but gives up eventually to the lack of strength in his body.

Silence looms around them for a fleeting moment, no one really knowing what to say or do next. 

Josh does. There really was no time for anything else.

“Tyler—“ Josh starts with, but the peasant stops him, unknowing. But he's finally starting to pay attention to their surroundings, rolling his head against the rough pillow case, talking over him. Maybe it's better.

“Where’s—” Tyler swallows. “Where’s this?” 

He looks confused, running his gaze against the dark ceilings. 

Josh sucks his lips into his mouth, turning to the Breton woman and growing aware of the scene they had caused, feeling his cheeks tint red.

Luckily, she doesn’t seem to notice, taking quickly over. 

“We’re on an old farm in The Pale, securely hidden amongst the shade of old pine trees at the root of the mountain. You got severely hurt Tyler. We secured the wound, but you lost a lot of blood. You shouldn’t strain yourself.”

“Thank you...”

“Um, Tyler,” Josh tries again, earning no attention to himself. There are sounds coming from the main hall, but Tyler doesn’t seem to hear, too deep in thought as he stares at the woman with his eyes narrowing suspiciously. Josh’s head turns back and forth impatiently, however too awkward to interrupt the two’s conversation.

Tyler blinks, twisting his face in a sudden bout of pain. His skin looks tight from the invisibly sticky traces of blood, delivering the taste of iron into his mouth. But it doesn't stop him from asking, and with his dry tongue weakly swiping against the corner of his mouth, Tyler asks,

“Who are you?” 

And she smiles, she smiles so gently and moves a stray strand of hair behind her ear to answer,

“I’m Tatum. I’m-“

Now, it might be a really bad timing because of Tyler’s weakness, but Josh can’t take the anticipation anymore.

“Tyler,” Josh repeats his name impatiently, talking over her rather rudely. But the peasant is finally looking at him and listening, and Josh can’t stop. “Tyler. You did it.”

Tyler stares at him, confused. However his attention gets quickly pulled to the door as the floorboards make a sound, indicating yet another presence joining the group. 

Tyler’s bleary eyes have finally fallen on Zack. 

A smile rises as tears fall.

Tyler scrambles up as if gotten shocked despite all the warnings. However no one tries to stop him as he cries out quietly, dizzy, his entire body quivering. He’s too weak to get free, shifting his weight on his shaking arms that can barely hold him up, the furs falling from his chest and pooling around him. 

Zack beats him to it with a couple of long strides with a smile on his face. He wraps his arms around Tyler’s shoulders and presses him back against the pillows before the other manages to leave the bed.

Tyler’s hands are lost. They lie limply beside his stunned body before slowly raising to take a loose hold of Zack’s shoulder blades. Careful, Tyler is so careful as if being afraid that he might disappear again, so full of disbelief he can barely breathe.

But the grip tightens, clothing crumpling. Josh watches the water pool in Tyler’s tired eyes until it gets too much and spills over the edges. Tyler squeezes his eyes shut and starts an unruly river down his pale cheeks that redden at the agitation. He tries to speak, but his words come out in a long fit of whimpers until he full-on sobs. Tyler doesn’t care about the other people staring at them as his taut hands tighten his grip around Zack’s tunic, feeling the warmth of his younger brother against his own body at last. And Josh watches them, truly seeing what their shared blood meant for them.

Tyler’s rattling chest brings him pain. Relieved crying turns into gritting his teeth and trying to smother his agony, but he fails at everything he tries. All he wants to do is cry, but he can’t do even that. 

Tyler gasps wetly, and Zack gives him space to breathe. Tyler’s hair is slick with sweat and long enough to stick to his damp forehead. Zack swirls a few locks away playfully and smiles, finally speaking,

“Well you’ve seen better days, haven’t you?”

Tyler snorts a smile, hiccuping. He can’t push it down, and he never should. He does it again and wipes the joyously salty trails off his cheeks when he can, not trusting himself with words just yet, shaking.

Instead, Tyler’s fist pulls into a sharp rock, white bones threatening to burst through the bloody skin. Flushing bright red, Tyler seems to hold something back before bursting into a laughter mixed with tears, whole body rattling. 

“I wish I could throw that punch, but I can’t,” he says the best he can, and Josh laughs quietly with him, knowing full well that Tyler’s words were directed more to him than anyone else in the room.

“Do _not_ make his wounds open, or I’ll nail both of your heads on the wall,” Tatum threatens, and they laugh, with Tyler covering his mouth as he’s clearly trying to hold back from starting to cry again. There's no stopping of the tears flowing past the corner of his eyes.

“I thought it was a dream,” Tyler whispers, proceeding to press his fingers to his raw eyes and wipe the fresh salt away to get a better look at Zack. “I knew I saw you, right before blacking out—“

“Yeah,” Zack only says, worry showing in his voice, the slight smile fading. “I saw you too.” His front is still covered in Tyler’s blood and wooden chips from the outside. They have different ways of coping with fear, Josh notes, with Zack immediately aiming his nervous energy on hard work, chopping the fire wood outside all night. 

“You’re having a baby,” Tyler suddenly says, his words carried by all the understanding he can gather.

“Yes, we really are,” Zack smiles proudly with Tatum standing behind him. The Breton rubs his back softly while the other hand rests against her growing tummy. “The child is going to be wonderful.”

“I’m happy for you,” Tyler says, and Zack leans back down, hugging him one more time. Tyler has no energy to return the gesture anymore. Zack understands it. He gets up, and says, 

“You need rest.”

Tyler nods tiredly, having no reason to argue. He’s feeble from the loss of blood, skin returning to it’s usual paleness as the hurricane of fierce emotions wipe the remaining tears away. It brings Tyler back to his usual fatigue, skin lacking the usual color of life. 

But Tyler is alive. He’s alive, safe and sound, and Zack is here with them.

Tyler closes his eyes, relief visibly washing over his strained body. Taken quickly by sleep, he closes his eyes and doesn’t open them for the rest of the night.

He’s in pain, but he got his peace.


	10. Brothers

Tyler sleeps well past the early morning hours the next days, slowly recovering and gathering his lost strength. The present day borders the late forenoon when Josh comes back from the woods, tying his pants back up. Inhaling a lungful of the frigid morning air, Josh hops over the puny fence, tilted from some places and grey of the cold weather. He returns to the open yard with a small well and a vegetable garden in it, frozen and unused. Having arranged who keeps an eye on the peasant at times, Josh was allowed to rest but also help with different tasks around the small farm.

“Half of the pen had been burnt down for whatever reason when I first got here,” Zack explains when they clear the half-collapsed fold, lifting a heavily charred element of wood together. “No remaining residents whatsoever. But it seems to been a household of a big family and some cattle. I knew this was the place when I found it so I took it and brought Tatum here,” he groans with sweat on his face, wiping it as Josh straightens his back easier.

“Just took it,” Josh repeats, smiling. “That’s pretty arrogant.”

“Things that are still usable shouldn’t be wasted. Technically I’m just clearing the chaos that has been left behind. These can still be used as firewood...” Zack keeps babbling, stepping over the heaps of burnt wood and carefully pulling an axe from the belt around his middle, his attention yanked from one task to another. 

There was a neat line of chopped firewood built around the house’s wall waiting to be used already. Despite the provided warmth inside the house, there was a lot of work to do. Wondering whether the two brothers even knew how to relax from time to time, Josh’s thoughts circled inevitably back to Tyler. He keeps glancing at the dark windows that the frost had claimed as its own. The dense cover of ice allows no access of curious eyes through it, but knowing that Tyler is inside around the warmth and resting, fills his heart with relief.

He hopes that the peasant has the energy to tend to his wounds properly, as weird as it sounds. Knowing Tyler, he might burst out of the door at any waking second, wanting to offer his help, or even force it. He already brought the idea up, but was immediately shot down like a clumsy chicken trying to fly by all three of them. The peasant pouted for half of the day before Josh lured him out of his shell with a warm meal that put him back to sleep soon after. 

That’s just how he is, and that’s why they’re keeping an eye on him. Tatum’s turn of making sure that Tyler stays put is ending soon. The emerging growling in Josh’s stomach is telling him that. However they had a lot to do until they could be nowhere near satisfied.

“I actually have no idea how to do this,” Zack’s gloomy confession brings Josh back, seeing the other man’s hunched posture as he tries to figure out how to replace the ruined woodwork with a new one without ruining the existing structure. 

Hard-headed and having no idea what they were actually doing, the two brothers were like merged shadows of each other. Josh smiles sympathetically. He can’t help but offer his aid in this case as well.

“My father works a lumber in Riverwood,” Josh informs the younger Roriksteadian. “He’s the owner of the sawmill there and knows the woodwork well. I know it doesn’t make me a carpenter, but I know some things. I can help you rebuild this thing.”

“Wow,” Zack wheezes in amazement. “Ahh dammit,” he continues, rubbing the back of his uncovered head. “I’d really appreciate your help then.”

“You’ll have it. It’s not like we’re— well,” Josh starts with, but stops before he can finish the sentence. Frowning, he doesn’t know how he meant to say what he wanted to say, but continues before the streaming words choke him completely. “It’s not like I’m leaving anytime soon. Not until Tyler heals at least. I have to make sure he’s gonna be okay.”

Zack hums, nodding and looking mischievously pleased with Josh’s words. And, _curses_ , he looks so close to his older brother. Josh is sweating.

“Good,” the peasant simply says. “I was hoping you’d say that. I’ll look more manly in Tatum’s eyes this way.”

“Doesn’t it make it look worse?”

“Only the final result matters, friend. Bretons are hard to please, I swear.” 

Josh laughs, hoisting more scrap wood over his shoulder. “Did you mean to make more firewood out of these?” he turns to ask then, careful not to hit anything.

“Yeah, just leave it there where the rest are. The charred parts would ruin the saw, so I’ll just make a fire outside or something,” Zack says. “You can go after that. Thanks. You’ve been a great help already.”

Normally Josh would decline, keeping up until it would be fair for both of them to call for a break. But now he gets to check up on Tyler, and it was his turn to set on the watch anyway. 

Putting the last pole down, Josh dusts himself off, quickly brushing his fingers through the mess of hair before fastening his top knot again. He can feel the grease leave a tacky marks behind, cringing. 

Maybe he can’t blame the two of their hard-working nature after all.

 

*

 

“He’s easy,” Tatum is the first to chirp as she passes Josh by just when he steps inside the house. She answers his questions before he even gets a chance to open his mouth, carrying their washed up tunics in her hands. “Sleeping soundly like a Khajiit in a broad sunlight.”

“Thanks for taking the first shift again,” Josh says politely, getting rid of the heavy furs and hoods, stomping on the floor to shake off the snow on his boots “I managed to catch enough sleep in the morning.”

“It’s okay,” Tatum assures, tying her broad sleeves in an accustomed manner to free her hands for work. “You spent the whole night by his side again. This is the least I can do, you know.”

“I wouldn’t say that,” Josh says as he faces her. The Breton looks at him askingly. Standing in front of her today, Josh is impressed by Tatum’s skills to handle such situations they’d gotten to witness only days before. Meeting her and Zack in the worst possible situation, Josh had known nothing about her, barely getting their names as they had hurried to the lone farm with Tyler’s hot blood blotting his clothes and smearing his hands. Even still, Josh had instantly known that he could trust Tyler’s life in her hands. Sure, he was terrified for his life, and only thinking about that day makes Josh’s skin crawl and the horrid _smell_ intensify, yet he had nothing but respect over her abilities to take over the heated situation.

It would have been too late for Tyler if Josh had been alone. He had rushed down the scarce path as quickly as he could, desperately trying to find the spot Tyler had fallen from. He had to take a different path to find his way down, the bear long forgotten. To his horror, Josh had only found an empty spot filled with nothing but Tyler’s blood painted all over the pristine snow, quickly following the red trail and footprints to finally find Tatum and _Zack_ with her. Like a miracle, the two had been outside gathering supplies and heard Tyler’s blood-curling scream when the bear had struck him down and came to his help then.

Judging by Zack’s eyes that time, he couldn’t believe it had been Tyler coming after him, bloodied and barely conscious. Josh remembers Zack’s letter before his disappearance, and how he had asked Tyler not to worry about him. Seeing him wounded and dying had shocked both of them equally. Tatum was the only one who had kept her calm then.

Dressed in a long dress that halfly dragged against the dust on the wooden floorboards, she could easily be taken as a Nord: long hair braided from the sides let the rest of her wavy locks fall freely on her bare shoulders, catching the glow from the blazing fire in the hearth of the main hall. The raw colors of umber reminds Josh of the glaring tundra around the Whiterun plains during the vibrant autumn season. Below her chest is a darker vest, barely fastened as there’s a little human growing up inside of her.

She brings life with her, but helps to keep it in this world as well. 

“You saved Tyler’s life,” Josh simply says. “I can’t thank you enough.”

Tatum is humble. She only smiles, warmly as she often does. “You don’t owe me anything, Josh. Remember that, always.”

Josh nods, however knowing that he’d never forget. He’ll always remember his debts, so he’s determined to help them as much as he can.

Moving on, Tatum takes a step towards the fire and the ingredients on the table. “Do you want to check up on him? I have to finish today’s meal.”

“Yeah.”

If anything, the stable sound of Tyler snoring is enough to tell that he’s alive. Josh enters the small bedroom quietly. Mouth hanging open, the pillow beneath Tyler’s head is rumpled from probable tossing, his heavy head thrown to the left side of it.

There’s some healthy color starting to tint his skin onto a healthier road; with his nose as blushy as always, Tyler keeps snoring away. He looks a bit tanner than Josh has seen him so far, noting these things easily as he takes his usual place on the chair next to Tyler’s bed. 

He silently wishes the room would have space for two beds, or Tyler wouldn’t be positioned right in the middle of his own so that Josh could climb in and take a nap as well. He doesn’t have the heart to do that now, letting Tyler to rest as he hasn’t gotten many chances to do that on his journey. Now he had to, since he’s pretty much bedridden, forced to wait until his body would regain its lost strength and blood again.

He’s excited to be the first person Tyler sees after waking up. Secretly glad that Tatum’s shift ended before that, Josh crosses his legs and sets his hands on his knee, swaying his foot as he waits for the peasant to open his eyes. 

It doesn’t take long for something to happen. Tyler lays motionlessly in the bed, until he doesn’t. Deep intake of breath, his head jerks suddenly to the other side, body taking a kick-start and waking him up as if been swatted. 

“The hoe,” the peasant gasps, delusional in his insistent dream.

“The— what? Tyler?” Josh cocks his eyebrow and leans forward on his seat, wood groaning upon his shifting.

Tyler’s eyes focus slowly, panting as his head falls back on the pillow. The apple of his throat bobs dryly, making an audible sound as he swallows. Feeling Josh’s presence next to him, Tyler’s neck cranes back to look at him. The skin on his forehead furrows like freshly plowed earth when his eyes land on Josh, noticing him only then. 

“What?” 

“Um,” Josh feigns off. “I guess you were dreaming. Did you have a nice dream?”

Tyler blinks, pupils returning to their normal size. 

“I don’t remember,” he blurts out chaotically, sounding nearly disappointed. 

Josh nods, waiting for the other to pick up his hassled mind.

“Home,” Tyler decides after a while. He remembers, eyes glassy and staring dreamily at nothing in particular at the thought of his faraway village. Josh sees the longing in his eyes, the probable thoughts of going back flickering in his dazed look. It makes his heart twinge weirdly, and Josh can only try and guess what goes through his mind that moment, wondering about his own purpose now that their task was done. 

Blinking, confused as well, Tyler turns to look back at Josh, smiling lopsidedly, still half-asleep.

“Hey,” he says. 

“Hey,” Josh grins back nervously, the smile making him feel easier then. “I was waiting for you to wake up.”

“So sweet,” the peasant rasps, clearing his voice then.

“Took you long enough,” starts the teasing, which Tyler smiles for, freeing his hand to brush it against the soft furs, curling and resting it over his side. 

A bout of silence follows. “How are you feeling, then?” Josh asks after it gets unbearable, watching Tyler look for the answer from the ceiling. Luckily, he doesn’t have to think about the answer for too long.

“Pretty good,” the peasant says and flicks his hand, moving it against his stomach then. “A bit hungry, though.”

“Tatum is making food,” Josh informs him, smelling the fresh bread already. Tyler smells it, too, drawing in air cautiously as his injuries were still hurting and reminding of their existence by every breath he took.

“I don’t understand how slacking off in bed all days can make you so hungry,” the peasant says frustrated, moving his foot under the covers restlessly as if having something else to say, and he does. “Also, um…”

Josh turns to look at him, confused. “What is it?”

A line creases Tyler’s brow. 

“I have to pee,” the peasant blurts, seemingly ashamed of his sudden needs and the audible growl of his stomach. It tints the color of his cheeks even brighter.

“Oh,” Josh says simply, getting up from the stool. “I’ll get the bucket for you again.”

“I want to walk.”

Josh halts at the words, unsure of the other’s strength just yet. This time, Tyler doesn’t drop his eye contact. He looks at Josh as if to ask him for permission, looking at him as if to challenge him. He doesn’t have to do that. Josh hates it.

Not giving voice to his thoughts, Josh asks instead, “Are you sure?”

“Yes,” Tyler’s answers confidently, eyes lighting up when Josh doesn’t oppose his wishes. He starts to creep out of the heavy cover of pelts on his own. “My muscles are getting tired of this.” 

Josh can only nod, knowing that a little walk will essentially be better for him. He stays close just in case, pulling his hands behind as he watches the peasant get up. 

And Tyler, he does, setting his bare feet on the cold floorboards. He tries to act quickly to impress him, Josh knows, however his stubborn nature is there to shake him back to the foul reality; a strong wave of dizziness washes itself clearly over the peasant’s face as soon as he straightens himself up. Gasping and swaying, Tyler’s blind hands look for their support from the wooden bedpost, seemingly lost as his legs can’t quite hold him up yet. 

Josh leaps to stand next to him then. “Slowly,” he tells him calmly, hand flat against Tyler’s spine as the other finds its place on his chest, holding him carefully up for the sake of the broken bones and the bandages around them. “You’re still weak.”

“I hate this,” the peasant curses, his voice cracking. There’s an invisible sack of frustration weighing on his shoulders. Only air it might be, yet it presses the peasant’s head low before Josh becomes his rock and gives him his aid. Hands and arms wrapping around each other, Josh helps Tyler to take one step at a time.

“Slowly,” Josh muses again steadily, pulling Tyler’s arm over his shoulders to have a better hold of him. Proudness veils his eyes as Tyler’s movements grow steadier by every second, shaking off the dizziness like the fighter he is. “Next time will be better.”

“You’re my hero, Josh,” Tyler muses softly with his eyes raising up and nailing themselves on his face. “I like your beard,” he blurts out of nowhere and sets his hand over Josh’s chest to steady himself more.

Josh doesn’t take the compliment, but hopes that his facial hair is enough to cover the heat climbing to his cheeks. “Don’t get too excited,” he mocks the other the next instant over another small step that they take together. “Don’t want you to wet yourself,” and Tyler chuckles quietly at his words, taking full advantage of Josh standing so close to him.

“We’ve been through worse than that.” 

 

*

 

There are herbs tucked beneath the peasant’s bandages. They burn his skin, burn his wounds as he can feel their power rushing into his flesh and bloodstream, cleansing his violated body of any threats that might dwell within. The burn anchors and clears his head in the weirdest way possible, or that’s what he tells Josh. It’s just that their influence make him sweat and tremble at the same time, like a fever and it’s true; Josh notices it only when being in touch with his body. 

Despite the small walk clearly having its cheering up effect on Tyler, the peasant seems almost faint by the time Josh helps him crawl back under the covers. The bruises from his ribs and the new ones from the fall reach their tameless black fingertips past the bandages all around. Tyler curses but smiles all the same at the pain, trying to settle and find a comfortable position. Josh fixes the pillow behind his back. 

“Thanks,” Tyler says, holding his side. By now, their whole journey shines through his appearance. Tyler once said he was a terrible sight, but Josh is not so sure about that. His own face is still roughed up with bruises on his back with a secure bandage rounding his left bicep where the bear had struck him with its sickles, the sharp cuts only getting on their road of healing.

They’re quite a sight together. 

The small space Tyler is positioned in has quickly become the center of the house. And by the end of the day, they eat and they drink there together, all the while getting to know each other better as one was always a stranger to another. 

They haven’t really had time to go through everything that has happened. So they start on their meal, talking as they often do. Spiced cabbage with butter, boiled with small chunks of pork and a piece of bread steam in their hands, wooden spoons dragging against the deep bowls.

“What happened to the bear?” Tyler is soon to ask, his eyes nailed on Josh. 

“I don’t know,” Josh answers honestly, sitting at the foot of Tyler’s bed, facing him. His legs hang halfly over the edge. “You think I had the time to look when I saw it nearly rip you through? I rushed right back down to find you but Zack and Tatum made it there before me.”

Massaging life into his thighs, Tyler takes the words in with an unreadable face before looking at his brother.

“In Rorikstead, we don’t have to deal with bears very often,” Zack starts with. “There are no forests there, but sometimes they come down from the mountains to look for food. Some villagers see them near the village every once in a while. They trample over the crops or dig the roots from them, but they’re not a threat to the cattle or the people, really. Sabre cats are a lot more common there and the border of The Reach in general. I’ve never seen a bear with silver hair before, and certainly wouldn’t have fought one.”

Tyler nods absently. Josh does too, knowing the deal with these animals. “I’ve hunted down bears many times before, especially in The Rift where they cause a lot of trouble there sometimes,” he tells them, thinking back to the flamingly colorful trees and the beasts hiding amongst them. His voice takes turn to a shakier one then. “The Snow Bear was different. I didn’t expect it to be so aggressive, I didn’t expect it to attack so suddenly—“

His words visibly pain Tyler. “Josh, you don’t have to explain yourself—“

“It would have ripped your throat open if you hadn’t staggered off that precipice,” Josh says with dreadful flatness to his voice, a shivering serpent starting its way up his spine as he stares at Tyler with hauntingly wide eyes, silencing him. Looking at Tyler’s bandaged chest, Josh realizes that he might still be in a shock after the current events. He can’t help but let his words talk for himself. He needs to get them out. 

Being too far from Josh to touch him, Tyler presses his foot against him silently, an indication that he’s there for him. It calms him down before the guilt and anxiety can take over him fully. It’s weird, really. Wondering whether he was allowed to feel weak but also show it, Josh faces away from the three of them. It was not his place to show his anxieties when it was Tyler who had taken the hardest part. The peasant seems to disagree with him, however.

”I don’t want you to blame yourself.”

Zack and Tatum leave to get something from the main hall, giving them some privacy. Shaking his head and trying to go back to the common way of thinking, Josh keeps talking just to get it out. “Luckily it had just eaten when we encountered it. I spotted a bloodied corpse of a deer near the spot where we saw it. The bear was only playing with our lives. It probably just defended its spoil when it attacked.”

Tyler takes his words, feeling for the warm wooden cup in his grip and spinning it slowly in his hands. When their eyes meet again, Tyler gives him a tender smile, wordlessly telling him that he’s gonna okay. They’ll both be, and Josh believes him the more Tyler keeps caressing his leg. 

“Beasts like that sure have vulgar ways to entertain themselves,” Zack says as he comes back from the main hall, bringing Josh a warm drink instead of an ale, and their short reassuring moment is over. Stretching his hand out, Zack carefully moves it past Josh’s shoulder, letting go only after his hand is securely holding it. 

Tatum brings more cups on a wooden tray. There’s goat milk in it, mixed with sweet summer honey. It’s hot and pleasant, steaming as Tyler brings his own cup to his lips, taking a careful sip.

“Good?” Tatum asks then, and Tyler nods his head with his eyes wide, drinking more without even answering. Through the night, moving on to other topics, the path takes them inevitably to the border of Eastmarch, the city that the two of them never got to see with their own eyes. Questions raining down, Tyler’s younger brother answers to them the best he can. 

“Yes, I saw it. The city is ancient, much to its reputation. I’ve never been colder than that in my life, despite the city walls rising high and protecting the people from the worst of the mountain winds. Sometimes I felt like the sun never appeared over those walls. The streets were dark and narrow, dangerous like a maze if one was to get lost in their chaos. Soldiers and war orphans ran all over the alleys. Little children trying to sell frozen flowers to come by, or—” Zack says and nearly chokes up at the memories.

It hasn’t been easy for him either. Barely gathering himself, Zack continues.

“But I had to get there, barely made it past the gates. The guards wouldn’t let me in. Luckily Tatum was there to anticipate me. She told the guards that I was a soldier coming home to see my beloved family, and I damn straight felt like that. Being able to hold both of you in my arms made it all worth it,” the younger pheasant concludes, looking at his love and their unborn child. Tyler seems like he wants to add something, it might be anything really, but he catches himself, seeing the two together and really caring about each other. 

He seems suddenly small and lonely, sitting at the end of the bed by himself. Tyler looks at Josh nearly pleadingly then, shifting to the side as if to make room for him. Feeling his body freeze involuntarily at the invitation, Josh turns away from the peasant, earning a sad-twisted face in return that the pretends to not notice. And Josh can’t help but wonder, 

_Why is he like this?_

Oblivious of their silent struggle, Tatum takes them deeper inside the oldest city of Skyrim.

“But it was clear that we couldn’t stay there either. I told it to Zack before he even came, but he still did,” Tatum says. ”My family is originally from High Rock before settling in Markarth. We’re only one of the families that escaped the city and left with Ulfric’s troops after The Incident and The Empire’s attack. It would soon start the first fires of war... My father had friends amongst their people. We thought we would be safe with them and The Stormcloaks, so we left. But with Windhelm becoming the new stronghold for the rebellions, The Empire is sure to follow them there and set their eyes on the city gates. There’s no way to know when the army is going to attack and set Skyrim in one last chaos by taking down the people who only want freedom.”

”Apparently Ulfric doesn’t share any informations with his citizens,” Zack says.

”Of course not,” she says. ”No one knows where he is. He leads the troops after his father’s death. So I don’t even think he’s in Windhelm anymore. You can tell by the lesser amount of guards around The Palace.”

Allowing a short sigh for herself, the Breton sets her hand on her growing tummy. ”The entire province is at chaos. Living in the city of the other half of the cause of it is impossible when you don’t want to take any part in it. My family’s blood doesn’t thirst for these lives. This is not our homeland, and I don’t want to bring a child in the middle of death and disorder.” 

Fixing her position on the stool next to Zack, Tatum continues. ”My mother and father would still work with the people who got wounded in the battle, while I was given the chance to continue with my alchemy studies. Sometimes I would go in with them and help to tend to the soldiers’ wounds, or ease their pain with my potions.”

It only makes sense. Now knowing where her knowledge came from, both Tyler and Josh listen to her tell about her roots. 

“It wasn’t always easy. There were more than fifty people squeezed in a earthen room with dozens more coming every day, and no one knew where to put them after the temple ran out of space. So the new war hospital was build in a forgotten cellar of the brothel above. The moans and whimpers have turned into the ones of pain ever since then, some men always pleading to die, while the others were there to end their lives. At night, the building was nothing but a mass of grave.”

“Not the best place for a pregnant woman,” Zack says gloomily.

“I wasn’t,” Tatum gives an obvious reply. “That’s why I concentrated on the art of alchemy, and my parents let me after they found out about my pregnancy. I wouldn’t have to go down there, but I could still help in my own way. I think that’s the cause why I finally earned myself the greatest teacher in Windhelm. However I never made it further than an apprentice level. I’m still learning, but I’m good enough to continue on my own now. Nurelion was a strict teacher, but he taught me a lot,” Tatum finishes. Her hands are scalded from some places, a bitter lesson to show its existence. Josh notices it only then. 

“Nurelion,” Tyler goes thoughtfully. “That sounds like an elven name.”

“He’s a high elf,” Tatum proves him right. “He’s got his own shop and alchemy lab in the city. _The White Phial_ is what he named it.”

Having no patience to wait till the next question, Tyler pushes on. “What about The Palace? Did you get to see it up close despite all the guards?”

Zack smiles at Tyler’s unending curiosity. Teasing, he asks, “Why the sudden interest in Windhelm?” which Tyler blushes for, crossing his arms over his chest defensively.

Tyler frowns. “I-I don’t know. I’ve never been there. Can’t a man be a little curious?” 

The corner of Josh’s mouth turn upwards at Tyler’s stuttering. The peasant will never get over the fact that he had mixed Winterhold and Windhelm together while wandering around The Pale and trying to find his younger brother. However they’re not talking about _that,_ and Josh takes the chance to leave the room and take care of his bladder. 

Standing at the edge of the forest alone, the glow from the small windows barely reached him from the house. Josh doesn’t mind; he takes a leak below the beauty of the northern lights. A thousand shades of blues and greens mix together without a single edge to them. The two colossal moons reflect the sleeping sun’s light over the purity of the snow, casting long shadows over the ice. The shifting light ghosts over it, dancing the silent forest nearly mesmerizingly. 

Tugging himself quickly back into the safety of his pants to escape the cold, Josh is about to turn back before something catches his attention. His body moves on its own, silent as he crouches behind the bushes to hide himself. Senses sharp like a freshly forged dagger, Josh’s eyes graze the silent hills that break from the cracking snow.

And that’s when he sees it. A quick turn of a head, a dozen pair of glowing eyes flash towards him like the starry night sky, snorting, and Josh can’t believe his luck.

Moving slowly but quickly enough, Josh rushes back inside the house where the two brothers were still argumenting about something unnecessary. Tatum is leaning on on her hand boredly by the time he stumbles back with his head as the third leg. 

“Guys!” Josh exclaims, earning all the attention to himself. “I saw an entire herd of deer passing by just now. I’m going after them!” he decides in one go, grabbing the rest of his warm clothes to wrap them around himself, fastening his cloak.

“All so sudden? But it’s dark outside already!” Tyler replies frantically and starts to straighten himself up, but Josh brushes him quickly off before the peasant makes the mistake of getting up again. 

“Positive,” Josh tells him before abruptly stopping, facing Tyler and looking him in the eye before separating.

“You need to get back up on your feet again. To get your strength back,” he tells him, grabbing his weapon and quiver from the corner of the room. “We’re short on meat, right? I’ll get you something good to eat!” he says lastly and attaches the string of his bow to the other end before rushing out of the room just as quickly as he had barged in.

His body melts away the earlier stiffness in front of the peasant again. Josh allows himself to feel more useful this way.  _In his way,_ he nods to himself, throwing himself into night’s embrace again. And so slams the door closed, leaving behind a heavy blanket of silence. 

“Someone’s in love,” Zack blurts out and turns to look at Tyler. The peasant’s eyes stare widely, before his face twists into a smile, taut as he tries to smother it pathetically, both cheeks flamed.


End file.
